'Tearful Medal' Taekwondo's Lee Da-bin Wins Bronze in Women's Over 67kg... Second Consecutive Medal After Tokyo [Paris Olympics]

Tokyo Silver Medalist Da-bin Lee Wins Bronze in Paris

South Korea's Taekwondo star Da-bin Lee (28, Seoul City Hall) won an Olympic medal for the second consecutive time.

Da-bin Lee of the South Korean Taekwondo national team (Seoul City Hall) secured the 9th bronze medal for Korea in this tournament by winning the women's over 67kg bronze medal match at the 2024 Paris Olympics Taekwondo event held on the 10th (local time) at the Grand Palais in Paris, France.
[Image source=Reuters Yonhap News]

On the 11th (Korean time), Da-bin Lee defeated Germany's Lorena Brandl 2-1 (4-2 5-9 13-2) in the women's 67kg bronze medal match at the 2024 Paris Olympic Taekwondo event held at the Grand Palais in Paris, France, securing the bronze medal.

Da-bin Lee, who won a silver medal at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, earned a bronze medal at the 2024 Paris Olympics, marking her second consecutive Olympic medal.

In Korean Taekwondo, Da-bin Lee is the third athlete to win Olympic medals in two consecutive Games, following Kyung-sun Hwang (2004 Athens bronze, 2008 Beijing gold, 2012 London gold) and Dae-hoon Lee (2012 London silver, 2016 Rio bronze).

On this day, Da-bin Lee won against Petra Stolbova (Czech Republic) in the round of 16 and advanced to the quarterfinals with a dramatic comeback victory over her Hangzhou Asian Games rival Zhou Zheqi (China).

However, her challenge for the gold medal was halted after a narrow loss to Svetlana Osipova (Uzbekistan) in the semifinals. Undeterred, Da-bin Lee defeated Brandl in the bronze medal match to claim the bronze.

In the first round, Da-bin Lee took the lead by attacking the head just one second after the match started. Although she received one penalty point, she gained momentum with a punch attack.

In the second round, she conceded head attacks and fell behind 0-3 early in the match. Da-bin Lee quickly responded with punch attacks and head strikes to even the score at 4-4, but lost one point due to a penalty. After conceding points from Brandl's body attacks, Da-bin Lee lost the second round.

In the third round, Da-bin Lee took the initiative by attacking the head with a kick first. Leading 3-0, she scored 5 points with a spinning back kick to Brandl's head with 30 seconds remaining, fully taking control and ultimately securing the victory.

With Da-bin Lee's bronze medal, Korean Taekwondo earned three medals at this tournament. On the 8th, Tae-jun Park (Kyung Hee University) won gold in the men's 58kg category, and on the 9th, Yu-jin Kim (Ulsan Metropolitan City Sports Council) claimed the championship in the women's 57kg category.

Da-bin Lee's bronze is the ninth bronze medal and the 30th overall medal for the Korean team at this Paris Olympics.