South Korea's Lim Hyojun (front) competes during the men's 1500m final of short track speed skating event on the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympic Games at Gangneung Ice Arena, South Korea, Feb. 10, 2018. Lim Hyojun won the gold medal in a time of 2:10.485 and set a new Olympic record of the event. (Xinhua/Han Yan)
PYEONGCHANG, Feb. 10 (Xinhua) -- Lim Hyo-jun of South Korea upset defending Olympic champion Charles Hamelin of Canada to win the men's short track speed skating 1,500 meters gold medal of the PyeongChang Winter Games here on Saturday.
Sjinkie Knegt of the Netherlands narrowly missed the chance to become the first Dutch short track speed skater to win an Olympic gold medal as he took the silver at 2:10.555 while the bronze medal went to Semen Elistratov, a member of the title winning Russian men's relay team at the Sochi Games four years ago.
Staying back in the pack early in the nine-man final, Lim overtook the lead with two laps to go and held on to cross the line first with two minutes and 10.484 seconds.
The 21-year-old Lim also shattered the Olympic record of 2:10.949 which was set by his compatriot Lee Jung-su at the Vancouver Games in 2010.
Hamelin, who had become the oldest male athlete to win an Olympic gold medal in an individual short track event aged 29 years and 302 days at the Sochi Games, was disqualified for impeding. Another title favorite Hwang Dae-heon of South Korea crashed out of the race half way and did not finish.
Chinese Han Tianyu, the silver medalist behind Hamelin four years ago, failed to reach the final before settling for the eighth place.
