(Tokoname [Japan] = Yonhap News) Reporter Oh Myeong-eon = Kang Jun-i (17, Seoul Yeongdeungpo High School), a third-year high school student standing on the highest podium in his first major international competition at the age of 17, seemed confused by everything.
He was embarrassed and didn't know where to focus his eyes on the barrage of cameras in front of him. He carefully climbed to the top of the podium, lowered his head, and immediately blushed.
Unable to fully enjoy the joy of winning the gold medal as he was holding back the tears that kept flowing, he met with reporters after the awards ceremony and was unable to hide his overwhelming emotions, repeating over and over again, "It's really like a dream and I can't believe it."
Kang Jun-i, the Korean skateboarding national team member, proudly took first place with a final total of 180.85 points in the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games Skateboarding Men's Street Finals held at the Aichi Sky Expo Hall in Aichi Prefecture, Japan on the 27th.
This gold medal is a feat of beating all players from Japan, a world-class powerhouse, and drawing high scores from the judges with overwhelming trick performances.
Kang Jun, who turns 18 on his birthday in two days, smiled brightly and said, "I told my friends that it might be a 'smiling birthday' or a 'crying birthday' depending on the results of this Asian Games, but fortunately, I think it will be a smiling birthday."
He continued, “I am even more happy because I won a gold medal in my first international competition wearing the Taegeuk symbol, and it is the first Asian Games gold medal in Korean skateboarding history.”
As he said, this is the first time for a Korean athlete, male or female, to win a gold medal in this event since the 2018 Jakarta-Palembang Games, when skateboarding was first introduced as an official event in the Asian Games.
Skateboarding street is a sport in which people freely use their skills in a stadium modeled after street structures such as stairs, railings, and benches.
The 'Run', which involves navigating the course for 45 seconds, and the 'Trick', which shows a single difficult technique, are each scored out of 100, and then the ranking is determined based on the combined total score out of 200.
In the first period of the day's run, Kang Jun-i took the lead with clean performance while rival Japanese players were shaken by a series of mistakes, and in the third period, he performed a perfect run that surprised even he himself, scoring a high score of 88.45 points.
However, a crisis came during the trick session that followed.
He attempted the 'Nally 270 Heelflip Lipslide', an ambitious and difficult technique, but fell in succession in the second period as well as in the first period, scoring only 0.00 points.
When the second attempt failed, Kangjun immediately burst into tears and became frustrated, and covered his face with the clothes he was wearing to control his emotions for a long time.
But I didn't give up or back down. In the third period, which was his last chance, Kang Jun-i again tried the same technique that he had failed to do twice before.
Kang Joon powerfully kicked up the front of the board and jumped, then rotated the board with his heels in the air and simultaneously twisted his body 270 degrees.
He then slid down with the center of the board stably resting on the railing, completing a complex and difficult technique.
As soon as he finished landing, he roared as if he knew he would win, and this time he shed tears again, but they were tears of joy, completely different from the previous regret.
Kang Jun-i looked back on the situation at the time, saying, "After falling on the second trick, I thought, 'I prepared so much, but it ends like this?'" and "But seeing the people and my mother cheering me on in the stands, I gathered my courage and took on the final challenge, and I succeeded."
He added, "When I saw my mom in the audience, I decided that I would really repay her this time as she always believed in me."
He first started boarding at the age of 8 and received attention as a skateboarding prodigy on the TV program 'Gifted Talent Discovery'. He has now grown into a star representing Korea in name and reality.
Kang Jun was moved as he recalled his past, where he had quietly nurtured his dream in a harsh environment.
He said, “I grew up in Yangsan, Gyeongsangnam-do, and when I first started riding a board, I practiced on the ground. Even when I started dreaming of becoming a player, there was no proper training ground.” He added, “For several years, I took a late-night bus to Seoul every Friday to practice at the park, and then went back to Yangsan on the latest bus on the weekend.”
He said, "Ever since I trained like that, my biggest goal was to win a gold medal in the Asian Games, and I can't believe that my dream moment has become a reality."
Although he won a gold medal in his first appearance at a comprehensive international competition where the public's attention is focused, Kangjun is in fact already writing a new history of Korean skateboarding on the international stage without hesitation.
In November 2024, he became the first Korean to win the world-class amateur competition 'Tampa Am', and earlier this year, he even won the biggest prize money (approximately $50,000) coveted by professional skateboarders around the world and the debut stage of the most prestigious 'Street League Skateboarding' (SLS).
The 17-year-old boy, who has begun to dominate the world beyond the Asian stage, is now setting his sights on higher places.
Kang Jun-i expressed his strong aspirations, saying, “My biggest goal right now is to take first place at the LA Olympics.”
