South Korea Disqualified for Incidental Contact During Short Track Roller Derby Relay

I think the judges had made a right decision. The Koreanteam should be disqualified. I’ve watched the video (slow motion) againand again. It is very clear that the Korean girl pushed the Chinese girl withher right hand. At that moment, as her pace of moving, her right arm wassupposed to move to her front. But she let it stay hack and push the other girl very skillfully. If there weren’t cameras from different angles then probably nobodywould find out. But it is a high-tech world, too bad for the Koreans.

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First of all, thank you for taking your time and posting this. I totally agree with you, I think the koreans should have won that gold. I know short track is very strict on the rules of contact and everything but it seemed as though the arm tap was accidental. Like in all olympic sports such as running, skating and swimming, moving (swinging) the arm is essential for building and maintaining speed. In this situation, the Chinese skater just happened to be there right behind the korean at the wrong time which optically looked as though the korean interferred with them.

But in conclusion, that’s life. Things won’t always go the way, things should be. I feel bad for those Korean athletes. I really think they deserved the gold. We all know Koreans would have won that race no problem lol. And Im pretty sure, the teams would not want a re-race at all, that for sure.

Korea Fighting Feb/26 ….

why don’t you go this youtube?
www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4SmLOIinN4
It was not korea fault.
It was referees’ fault

The exchange wasn’t Canada’s fault, it was the US. In relay rules for shorttrack if you’re behind another team you’re required to take the farmost inside. The US skater stayed right behind the Canadians instead of going inside and put herself behind the other relay member of Canada. Look at the picture. Everyone is in perfect alignment except the US team. The Us team should be down another "lane". You can see the space between the Canadian team and the skaters in the inside circle. They were in the wrong spot.

the reason it wasn’t brought up was because the US could have been DQ’d for pushing another member from behind if deemed malicious.  Since the US was so far behind they didn’t even bother to look at it and it gave them no advantage.

i definitely feel for Korea.. but you must be stupid to declare that canada blocked the US.. Look at your 2nd pic they were clearly in the right position just as china and korea were. That sharped turn was pretty much the same turn that everyone did. Canada was still in the pushing motion. They were already ahead of the US so there was no reason for them to block them but focus on Korea "takes the turn sharply to move ahead of South Korea, thereby cutting off the United States.". so immature. US is pretty much good at everything but just because they lagged behind doesnt mean something isnt right happened. This is so insulting.  You really condradicted yourself on this one. To say that they did it on purpose then " I’m not saying what the Canadians did was cheating". 

It is the passer’s responsibility to not make contact during the pass, and the americans are at fault for not choosing a better lane for their push.  the canadians cannot be blamed for not looking back to see if an american is pushing behind them.  these are the rules, and it’s also the case as to why S. Korea was DQ’d.  because the passer made contact with the passee.  if you really want to get into a DQ for the american/canadian contact, the american should be DQ’d for making contact with the skater in front of them, and they are lucky to retain the bronze which they were lucky to get (and that push was not the reason why they fell 5 second off the canadians, not even close.

Well, I don’t know much about the skating rules. but at least i know, as an athlete, one has to show respect to the ref’s decision.
Take a look at the South Korean team coach, Choi Guang-Bok. He was almost yelling at the ref.
In case you don’t know, before the Games, when a Chinese team spy tried to record Korean teams during the training session. the coach yelled at him and expeled the cameraman. but later, the same guy, Choi, asked several Korean spies in disguise to record Chinese team during their training. wow.

it seems that Koreans don’t like China taking away their gold. just one day after, before another short track game, THE KOREAN COACH, CHOI GUANG-BOK, THREW A WATER BOTTLE TO THE CHINESE CAMERAMAN. AS HE DIDN’T MAKE IT, HE THREW ANOTHER AND ANOTHER AGAIN. http://www.nbcolympics.com/news-features/news/newsid=418301.html

again, after this relay match, the same Korean coach told the jounalists that the Chinese have STOLEN their gold medal. well, i can’t believe a national team coach can speak like that. If I’m not mistaken, there has been at least 20 athletes disqualified during these days, including US, Canadian, Chinese athletes. no one had behaved so badly like him. shame for him.

Wow Dan, you weren’t kidding when you said "I clearly don’t know what I’m talking about with the rules of this sport".  Perhaps in the future you should take the time to learn the rules before writing such an article.  If you understood the rules, you would find your statements are complete garbage. 

The rules of short track are very clear that the passee or lead skater always has right of way until the other skater (passer) gets COMPLETELY past them.  You stated that Korea had already made the pass before making the incidental contact, which is not true.  They had come up beside the other skater, but not completely past them.  This made it their responsiblity to yield right of way to the China team.  Even though contact may be incidental, if it is beleived to have impeded the progress of the skater with right of way, it is clear grounds for disqualification.  It was very clear that Korea’s incidental contact did just that.

In the case of Canada, they were the lead skater.  The only skater in jeopardy of disqualification was the US skater.  Since she didn’t really impede Canada’s progress, it was not called.  If they had, the US would have been disqualified as well, and rightfully so.  The referee’s job is to properly apply the rules, which they did.