Joo Jae-hoon, A Member of the National Archery Team

Asian Games Joo Jae-hoon, A Member of the National Archery Team, Who Won a Silver Medal as a Hobby, says, “It’s Better than a Promotion”

Runner-up in mixed archery competition with So Chae-won… I learned posture through YouTube, practiced at club competitions, and had insufficient training time while juggling work… Solved with ‘compression training’ to shoot 3 times faster

Professional athlete So Chae-won, who caught the bow late, said, “Jae-hoon oppa is a great motivator.”

Joo Jae-hoon (Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power) smiled brightly while holding the silver medal in exchange for a year’s salary.

Joo Jae-hoon and So Chae-won (Hyundai Mobis) lost 158-159 to India’s Oyas Praveen Deotale and Jyoti Surekha Bennam in the final of the compound archery mixed event at the 2022 Hangzhou Asian Games held at the Fuyang Inhu Sports Center archery range in Hangzhou, China on the 4th. I hung a silver medal around my neck.

Unlike recurve, which is an Olympic sport in which Korea has overwhelming results, skill in compound is standardized globally, making it much more difficult to win a medal in international competitions.

Among such compound events, the difficulty of winning a medal is higher in the mixed event because each country sends the best male and female athletes in pairs. 안전놀이터 토토사이트

This is a truly precious silver medal for Korean archery.

Joo Jae-hoon

For Joo Jae-hoon, it has greater meaning.

This is because it is the result of hard work, even temporarily giving up his livelihood.

Joo Jae-hoon is not a professional athlete but an archery enthusiast.

In 2016, when I was a college student, I took up archery by chance by joining a compound archery club in Gyeongsan, Gyeongsangbuk-do.

Achieved overwhelming results in the club competition.

Joo Jae-hoon, who discovered his ‘talent’ late, passed the 2023 national team selection competition after five attempts and earned the Taegeuk symbol.

Unlike other national players whose livelihood is archery, Joo Jae-hoon had many things to worry about other than archery.

When Joo Jae-hoon, who works as a police officer at Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power Company, became a member of the national team, he had to take leave from work to train at the Jincheon Athletes’ Village and participate in international competitions.

Of course, it was unpaid leave.

His family also had to be persuaded.

There won’t be many wives who would support her husband’s decision to take a year off from work to pursue ‘hobby activities.’

Fortunately, Jae-hoon’s wife gave permission.

His wife takes care of her two sons almost alone, without any income from her husband.

Joo Jae-hoon, who met with reporters in the joint coverage area (mixed zone) after the game, said, “I want to dedicate the honor of the silver medal to my family, the local community in Uljin, Gyeongsangbuk-do, and company officials.”

When asked what he would choose between a promotion and a silver medal, Joo Jae-hoon smiled with an embarrassed expression and said, “It’s really hard to choose.”

He then looked at the medal hanging around his neck and answered, “Silver medal.”

‘Isn’t this a medal in exchange for a year’s salary?’ When asked by reporters, he replied, “That’s true.

But I have no regrets.”

However, he said with a confused expression, “Of course, my wife may think differently.”

It was not easy to combine work life and archery training, but Joo Jae-hoon turned those limitations into advantages.

Joo Jae-hoon said, “Professional athletes have a somewhat military-style schedule.

I have a free-spirited style (in training and attitude), so I don’t think I would have grown this much if I had started as an athlete.”

Joo Jae-hoon said that he learned foreign players’ posture, equipment tuning methods, and mental management know-how through YouTube.

And as he continued to participate in hobbyist competitions, he ‘practiced’ what he learned and made it his own.

“I think I was able to do a lot of things to catch up with professional players because I had a lot of options (unlike professional players),” Joo Jae-hoon reflected.

Being an office worker, the constraint of not having enough training time was not a big problem for Joo Jae-hoon.

So Chae-won

After work, he trained for about 2 to 3 hours, and he said he saved time by shooting an arrow at three times the speed of professional athletes.

Joo Jae-hoon said, “Usually it takes 15 minutes to fire 6 shots, but I shot them in 5 minutes.

It was my own condensed training method.

I think I trained a lot in my own way.”

So Chae-won, who was next to me, said, “I started archery late, so I know how difficult it is to catch up late.

Thinking about how hard my brother trained, it was a great motivation for me.”

So Chae-won was introduced to recurve through after-school activities in middle school and began her career as a compound player in earnest in high school.

Chae-won So, who is in her 7th year on the national team, has been playing as a ‘two-top’ member of the women’s national team with veteran Oh Yu-hyeon (Jeonbuk Provincial Office).

So Chae-won, who won silver medals in the mixed gender event in two consecutive competitions following the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta and Palembang, confessed, “I feel like I didn’t do much better than Joo Jae-hoon, so I’m a little disappointed about that and I’m a bit sorry.”

She went on to say, “There is talk that she may have compound as an event in the 2028 LA Olympics.

She will look ahead and prepare,” she pledged.

In order to protect his livelihood and family, Joo Jae-hoon plans not to compete for the national team for the time being until this year.

Joo Jae-hoon, who said, “I think I will be fired from the company if I say ‘I will represent the national team’ again next year” said, “I will think again when it becomes an official sport in 2026.”