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Korean Women Win Archery Gold

STONE MOUNTAIN, Ga. (AP) -- Imagine aiming for a gold medal and instead almost missing the entire target.

That's what happened to German archer Cornelia Pfohl, and it helped South Korea stretch its championship streak in the women's team event at the Olympics.

Germany led 162-161 with nine arrows left in the gold-medal match Friday, when Pfohl shot a 1, the outermost ring on the target. Visibly shaken, she gave way to teammate Sandra Wagner, who hit a 9 and a 10.

The mistake opened the door for individual gold medalist Kim Kyung-wook, who hit the bullseye three straight times. Teammate Kim Jo-sun followed with a 9 and two 10s to give South Korea control of the match and its third straight women's team gold.

``When we got behind, we weren't shaken,'' Kim Kyung-wook said. ``When we found one arrow was one point for the competition, of course we had confidence. That is why we had three straight arrows for 10 points.''

In the men's team competition, the United States advanced to the gold-medal match with three victories.

Six straight 10s at the end gave the Americans a 251-247 victory over Italy. It was the same score the U.S. men had in their two previous matches to tie an Olympic record that was also broken Friday.

The U.S. women were eliminated by a 235-226 loss to Kazakstan in their first match Friday. They lost on the last six arrows.

Germany's women, ranked second in the world, shot for the gold medal after Barbara Mensing had two 10s on the last three arrows in a 239-237 semifinal victory over Turkey.

Poland won the women's bronze medal with a 244-239 victory over Turkey.

South Korea, the world's No. 1-ranked team before the Atlanta Games, has dominated women's archery the past 12 years. In addition to all three team gold medals since the event was introduced, the Koreans have won all four individual gold medals and eight of 12 individual medals overall since 1984.

In the morning round, the U.S. men had a 27-arrow team scoring record in a 251-235 victory over India. That tied an Olympic mark set by South Korea in 1992.

They then had another 251 in a victory over Ukraine, at the same time that Australia was posting a new record of 253 in a victory over Sweden.

A women's Olympic team record was also set. In the quarterfinals, South Korea won 249-226 over Sweden, breaking its own record of 246 set at Barcelona four years ago.

Lindsay Langston, a 17-year-old from Mesa, Ariz., had two 10s and a 9 in her last turn as the U.S. women tied Kazakstan at 180 with six arrows left. The Americans never took the lead after Kazakstan's Yana Touniiantse outshot Judi Adams of Scottsdale, Ariz., 29-24 in the next round.

``There was no single thing that happened. We just didn't have it,'' Adams said. ``We got strong shots from everybody, but didn't shoot enough 10s.''

The third member of the U.S. team was Janet Dykman, who advanced to the individual round of 16.