Archer Park Kyung-mo shoots an arrow during the men's team competition at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing on Monday./AFP

In the final of the men's archery team competition, Korean trio Im Dong-hyun, Lee Chang-hwan and Park Kyung-mo edged out the Italians by just two points, 227-225, earning the team the third consecutive gold medal since 2000 in Sydney. The Korean women’s team won gold a day before, its sixth consecutive gold in the Olympics since the 1988 Seoul Games. The women’s individual competition begins on Tuesday, and the men’s on Wednesday.

Im Dong-hyun, left, Park Kyung-mo, center, and Lee Chang-hwan pose with gold medals for the men's team archery competition at the Beijing 2008 Olympics in Beijing on Monday. /AP

Nam Hyun-hee won silver in the women’s individual foil event. Standing only 154 cm tall, the no. 4 ranked fencer in the world faced the no. 1, Valentina Vezzali of Italy, who is a full 10 cm taller, in the finals. The match was a nail biter, tied at five until Vezzali scored the winning point with just a few seconds remaining, ending the match 5-6. It was Vezzali’s third consecutive Olympic gold medal.

Nam Hyun-hee, left, attacks Giovanna Trillini of Italy in the semifinals of the women’s individual foil event held in the Fencing Hall of the National Convention Center in Beijing on Monday evening./Yonhap

Judoka Wang Ki-chun, who competed in the men’s 73-kg class, made it to the final despite the injury he sustained during a hard-fought quarterfinal match against Brazil’s 2004 Athens bronze medalist Leandro Guilheiro that went to sudden-death golden point time as the winner was not decided during the regular five-minute match.

Wang Ki-chun has tears in his eyes with a silver medal hanging around his neck during the medal ceremony of the men’s 73-kg class judo event at the Beijing Science and Technology University Gymnasium on Monday./Yonhap

Wang sustained an injury to his left side but beat Guilheiro with a waza-ari and subsequently advanced to the finals. But he had to compete with a bandage taped around his body to reduce the pain. With just 13 seconds into the final against world no.1 Elnur Mammadli of Azerbaijan, Mammadi caught Wang in the ankle and rolled him over with kibisu-gaeshi, ending the game with an ippon.

As of 10 a.m. on Tuesday, Korea had four gold medals and four silver, standing in second place after China’s nine gold, three silver and two bronze and ahead of the United States’ three gold, four silver and five bronze.

(englishnews@chosun.com )