Figure skater Kim Yu-na (second from left) and her juniors Kim Hae-jin (third from left) and Park So-youn (right) take part in an interview with a TV host in a welcome-home event at the Time Square Atrium in Seoul, Tuesday, after returning from the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics. (Yonhap)
After settling for silver in a controversial decision at the recent Winter Olympics, figure skater Kim Yu-na reiterated on Tuesday she has fully put that “absurd” result behind her.
Kim, the 2010 Olympic champ in ladies’ singles figure skating who took the silver at the Sochi Winter Games last month, met hundreds of her enthusiastic fans at a Seoul shopping mall. She shared with them her thoughts about what many experts and fans felt was a rigged judging decision that denied her a second straight Olympic title and handed the gold instead to the upstart Russian teenager, Adelina Sotnikova.
Though Sotnikova made a landing mistake during her free skate and Kim put together a clean routine, the South Korean finished more than five points behind the Russian. In the aftermath, Kim graciously said she fully accepted the result and the decision was out of her control.
Kim, who retired from the sport after Sochi, said once again the judging saga is well in her past.
“It was all very absurd but I was just happy that it was all finished,” she told the fans. “I have never gone over the result and thought what might have been.”
Before Sochi, Kim had said she wasn’t dying to win another gold medal after capturing one in Vancouver in 2010, and she didn’t have any regrets even after the close call in Sochi.
“I felt I could still feel a bit disappointed if I don’t win the gold, since I am human after all,” she said. “After it was all said and done, I concluded that I really wasn’t that desperate for the gold.” (Yonhap)