Kim Gil-li of Korea, front, celebrates after winning the gold medal in the women's 1,500-meter short track speed skating event at the Winter Olympics at Milano Ice Skating Arena in Milan, Friday. Yonhap

MILAN — Thanks to some late push from its short track speed skaters, Korea met its target of taking home at least three gold medals from the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics this month.

With its last athletes in action, a pair of four-man bobsleigh teams, well out of medal contention entering the final day of the Olympics on Sunday, Korea will likely finish with three gold medals, four silver medals and three bronze medals.

Korea won two golds, five silvers and two bronzes at the 2022 Beijing Winter Games. For the 2026 competition in northern Italy, the Korean Sport & Olympic Committee (KSOC) had set out to win at least one more gold medal than Beijing.

Short track speed skater Kim Gil-li delivered that third gold medal with her women's 1,500-meter title Friday night over teammate Choi Min-jeong. Earlier Friday, the men's 5,000-meter relay team raced to the silver medal.

Once again, short rack speed skaters did the heavy lifting in the medal race. They accounted for two golds, three silvers and two bronzes -- compared to two golds and three silvers in Beijing.

Kim Gil-li was the lone double gold medalist for Korea, as she anchored the women's 3,000m relay team to the title before winning the 1,500m gold. Kim also won bronze in the 1,000m and led all Korean athletes here with three medals.

Choi finished with the relay gold and the 1,500m silver. With seven career medals, Choi became the most decorated Korean Olympian, winter or summer.

On the men's side, the 18-year-old Rim Jong-un won bronze in the 1,000m and then combined for silver in the 5,000m relay. Hwang Dae-heon grabbed silver in the 1,500m to become the first Korean male short tracker to win a medal at three consecutive Winter Olympics.

The short track team had a particularly inauspicious start. Korea crashed out of the semifinals in its first medal event, the mixed team relay, when Kim got tripped up by Corinne Stoddard of the United States. Korea was also shut out of individual gold medals until Kim broke through in the women's 1,500m, the very last individual race in Milan.

Source: Korea Times News