Why is South Korea So Good at Short Track Speed Skating?

Those Korean kids grow up skating back and forth to school both ways, sometimes an extra trip at lunch... all at elevation...

...and uphill both ways!

Have you seen the calves on Asian men? WOW!

I work as a teacher in Korea. I can confirm that my students skate to school both ways, as well as back at home for lunch. They get beat if they're late, so they learn to skate speedily, hence their ability to do well in the sport of speedskating. In the brief Korean summer, when there's no snow, they rollerblade.

So true. I had no clue that Koreans were this good at skating. They owned it. I wish one of the canadian brothers had won, but heck, those koreans deserved it big time. I'm impressed by both the koreans and chinese at how good they are at these winter sports. They are the only non-white countries at the winter olympics who are actually good. Because if you noticed, almost everyone competing at the winter olympics is white, except for the chinese, koreans, japanese and shani davis.

Well, the Asian countries are also really good at table tennis and badminton, and I don't think they invented those either. They just like them a lot.

Russia, Georgia, Kazakstan, Iran are Asian countries with mixed Mongol-Caucasian races.

my guess:

1. cold climate=ice.

2. crowded cities=short tracks more prominent that long tracks....??????

3. short stature of people=holding tight turns well

1+2+3+ ain't shit else to do = good short track speed skaters.

DRUGS THEY'RE ON DRUGS

Korea is warmer than any northern part of the US in the winter, so cold weather can't really be considered a factor. Koreans in general seem to have short legs, which helps on turns in short track. That's why you didn't see any Korean long track stars in the Olympics (until this year, for some reason).

I lived in Korea until first grade when I moved to the States and I used to take speed skating lessons every week at the local rink there before I even learned how to ride a bike, so I guess there is a bit of a culture. I also did inline skating in the spring/summers a lot. But the Korean public doesn't really care about sports in general except for when a national star/team is on an international stage (e.g. World Cup, Olympics, World Baseball Classic) so it's not like there's fangirls everywhere looking for Lee Jung-su's autograph...

it is all the canals by the dikes.

they put all their eggs in one basket. Olympics are for glory and wealth forever.

Country pride is huge in communistic countries.

Those countries groom kids around 3 to become one thing or another in sports.

When did South Korea become communist?

The only people who think others are racists are racists themselves because researchers have discovered that there is only one human race that originated in the Rift Valley of Kenya, some 30,000 years ago. Thus, all former race myths regarding physical attributes are complete rubbish.

Exactly. That's why all dogs still look and behave exactly the same as Wolves.

Because about 3 countries in the world compete in this pseudosport. They happen to be one of them.

hannsen wrote:

Because about 3 countries in the world compete in this pseudosport. They happen to be one of them.

Bingo.

Similarly, the Koreans dominate archery. Tradition; elimination of size as a factor; and a choice to focus on the sport are all reasons why.

They are built for it, short and stocky