South Korean swimming sensation Hwang Sun-woo (20-Gangwon Provincial Office) has vowed to avenge his loss to Fan Zhan-li (CHN) in the 100m freestyle at the 2023 World Aquatics Championships.
Hwang competed at the 2023 FINA World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka, Japan over the past 30 days, where he won a bronze medal in the 200m freestyle final with a Korean record of 1:44.42.
In the 100-meter freestyle, however, she failed to qualify for the final after clocking 48.08 in the semifinals. His rival, Pan Zanler, finished fourth overall in the final with a time of 47.43.
Hwang will be in the challenger’s shoes when he takes on Pan Zhanle in the men’s 100-meter freestyle at the Hangzhou Asian Games in September. After arriving at Incheon Airport on the afternoon of the 31st, Hwang said in an interview, “If you look at my seasonal record in the 100m, I’m about half a second behind Pan Zhan’er. Half a second in the 100 meters is a big difference,” he explained.
“There’s a big gap, so I can’t guarantee that I’ll be able to close it in a month and a half, but I’ll have to train hard and try to reduce the gap as much as possible,” he said.
He believes that competing with Lee and others has been a positive for his time. “Certainly, I think it’s very helpful to have multiple athletes in the sport, not just one, so that we can race in good faith with each other in Korea and continue to improve,” Hwang said. “If you think about four years ago, the 48-second mark was the first place mark, but now it’s almost the eighth or ninth place with 48 seconds. So I’m very proud that the level of Korean freestyle is improving.”
“At the Gwangju World Championships, there weren’t many athletes in the final and semifinal stages, but at the Budapest World Championships last year and the Fukuoka World Championships this year, there were semifinalists, finalists, and medals,” he said. “I feel that Korean swimming has improved a lot, and I’m really happy to be here with them.”
He also expressed his ambition to raise the profile of Asian athletes in a sport that has been dominated by Westerners. 먹튀검증
“It has been said for a long time that swimming is almost a stage for Westerners, but seeing so many Asian swimmers win medals at the Fukuoka World Championships, I feel that it is not an impossible stage for Asians,” he said. “I hope that we can continue to train hard with the idea that nothing is impossible, and that we can achieve good records and good results.”