Park pounds path to taekwondo gold

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This article was published 11/03/2024 (919 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Tae-Ku Park will gladly add another notch in his belt, but his sights remain on a bigger stage.

The Winnipeg taekwondo artist handily defeated Quebec’s Aurele Tcheh NDE 2-0 (6-2; 9-3) to capture his third straight senior kyorugi lightweight (68kg-74kg) national championship at the RBC Convention Centre on Sunday.

The win qualified Park for the Senior Pan American Championships in Rio de Janeiro from April 26-28.

“I love to win nationals, but it’s never really been my ultimate goal,” said Park, who entered competition as the overwhelming favourite in the lightweight division. “When I was younger, yes, I always wanted to win nationals because that was the next step I had to take but, at this point in my career, my goals are the Olympics.”

The 22-year-old can not qualify for the Paris Olympics this summer but has already begun his push for 2028 in Los Angeles.

“The last two years, I’d say were more special, especially that first one,” Park said of winning a third national title in a row. “It was my first senior national but more than that, I qualified for the senior national team for the first time with my brother and sister. And then we did it again last year.

“So, not as cool as the first time but it’s still something that’s super amazing and I don’t take lightly. We get to travel the world and do what we love all together as a family.”

Braven, Tae-Ku’s younger brother and No.1 seed in this week’s bantam division, lost his championship bout in heartbreaking fashion on Friday. Tied in the dying moments of the final round, the 21-year-old made a costly error that allowed British Columbia’s Shane Britton to land a strike and win 2-1 as time expired.

It was a disappointing result for what many thought was a shoe-in to win another national title, but Braven’s hopes at representing Canada in Paris are still alive and well.

He will take the mat next at the Pan American Olympic qualifying tournament in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, where he must make it to the championship to secure a spot in the Olympics. The tournament goes April 9-10.

Braven is choosing to believe his last-second falter is a blessing in disguise.

“If everything went super well here and I fought my best, I would’ve gone into qualifiers feeling great and high,” said Braven. “But I think making some mistakes and having a last-second mix-up that ended up costing me the match, I think that helps me lock in a little bit more, it kind of fuels me a little bit more knowing that there’s still some things I need to fix.

“It gives me a little bit more motivation — a little more of a push — toward this last five weeks leading up to the qualifier.”

Eldest sibling Skylar, who already punched her ticket to the Paris Olympics, was in attendance to watch her two brothers this weekend.

“I’m super proud of them always,” Skylar said after Tae-Ku’s triumph. “They work really hard, and for Tae-Ku to make the national team again and represent Canada once again is exciting. Braven, obviously, had an unfortunate day yesterday — not his best — but he has bigger sights set this year on qualifying for the Olympics and so all eyes are on that and we’re trying to peak for that event in four weeks time.”

Fellow Manitoba product Hannah Driedger withdrew from her opening fight in the women’s middleweight division due to injury while Austin Wiebe finished fifth in the men’s poomsae U40 division on Friday.

joshua.frey-sam@freepress.mb.ca

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