S. KOREA AT THE OLYMPICS: Short track: Hard work pays off for South Korea, says US rival

Vancouver (AFP) - South Korea's dominance in Olympic Games short-track speed skating has been put down to sheer hard work by a US rival who should know - Korean-American Simon Cho. "In the Korean culture, athletes have a hardcore work ethic," the 18-year-old said Sunday, after South Korea narrowly missed a podium sweep in the men's 1500m final at the Vancouver Olympic Games. "That plays a key role in the success of the Korean team at the Olympics. Kim Seoung-Il, due to race for South Korea in the men's 5000m relay, agreed: "We work hard." Lee Jung-Su won the 1500m gold after leading a three-man Korean pack around the final bend where Sung Si-Bak and Lee Ho-Suk got tangled up and crashed into the boards. Americans Apolo Anton Ohno and J.R. Celski seized their opportunity to take silver and bronze. The result of the first short track final at the Games brought South Korea their 30th Olympic medal in the discipline, compared with 20 each for Canada and China and 14 for the United States. Of South Korea's medals, 18 have been gold. Ohno, now 27, stopped a Korean sweep of four men's golds at the Torino 2006 Games by winning the 500m. Cho, 18, was born months before the thrill-packed sport made its debut over the Olympic oval in 1992. He started short track at the age of three in Incheon, near the South Korean capital of Seoul, and moved with his family to Chicago at age five. Cho continued skating at clubs in Chicago before moving to Maryland in 2000 where he met Korean-born current US national coach Jimmy Jang. "I've competed against the Koreans and trained with them in Korea many times," said Cho, ranked eighth in the 500m World Cup rankings, who is due to race in the 500m and 5,000m relay in Vancouver. "There's something about them that makes them jump off the page," he added. "Their training programmes are written out very well." The 1,500m final has refueled the Korea-US rivalry which peaked when Ohno won the same event in his Olympic debut in Salt Lake City in 2002. South Korean hero Kim Dong-Sung finished first but was disqualified for blocking Ohno in the final turn, sparking a storm of Korean protests. Kim's fans sent 16,000 angry e-mails which crashed the International Olympic Committee's website. Ohno skipped a 2003 World Cup event in South Korea for security fears. In 2005, he finally went there and won races before an unexpectedly friendly crowd.

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