Park Tae Hwan Selected For Fourth Straight Asian Games

Photo Courtesy: Asian Games

South Korean swimming legend Park Tae Hwan was selected for his fourth straight Asian Games on Tuesday, per Yonhap News Agency in South Korea. The 28-year-old Park was one of 59 total swimmers selected to represent South Korea at the Games August 18-September 2 in Jakarta, Indonesia.

The Korean Swimming Federation has not released a full list of the selected athletes in English, but it was reported that Park, An Sehyeon, Kim Seoyeong and Back Suyeon were selected to compete for South Korea at the Asian Games.

Park won the 200 and 400 frees at the 2006 and 2010 Asian Games, the latter still standing as his national records in each event. The Korean Swimming Federation has yet to finalize each event the swimmers will compete in, but it is presumed Park will stick with the 200 and 400 free as he was a finalist in each event last summer in Budapest at the World Championships.

Park originally won two bronze medals at the 2014 Asian Games in his home country, but had to forfeit the medals because of a failed doping test.

An is making her first Asian Games appearance at age 22. She was fifth place in the 100 fly and fourth in the 200 fly at last summer’s World Championships, setting Korean records in both events in the process. Her 200 fly was the highest any Korean female swimmer has placed at either the World Championships or the Olympics.

Kim was sixth in the 200 IM final and ninth in the 400 IM at last summer’s Worlds. She will be making her second Asian Games appearance after she was fifth in the 200 IM in Incheon four years ago. Kim currently has the number one time in the world this year in the 200 IM.

Back will be competing at her fourth straight Asian Games. Her one medal in her three trips came from when she was 15 at the 2006 Games in Doha, where she won a bronze medal in the 100 breast. Back was sixth in the 100 and 200 breast and fourth in 2014.

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