‘Blind’ archer helps set Olympics’ first world record

London, July 27 (IANS/RIA Novosti) World records started to tumble even before the opening ceremony of the London Olympics Friday, with a legally blind South Korean archer the star.

Im Dong-Hyun set a new world record of 699 for 72 arrows in the men’s individual ranking round.
Second-placed Kim Bubmin, also of South Korea, scored 698, which also beat the previous record of 696 that Dong-Hyun set in May.
Their scores also counted towards the team event, where South Korea set another world record of 2,087, with Oh Jin Hyek’s 690 the third score to count toward the total. Despite his world-beating feat, Dong-Hyun vowed to keep his feet firmly planted on the ground.
“This is just the first round so I will not get too excited by it,” he said.
His coach Jang Young Sool said that the South Korean team would spend the rest of the day resting and preparing for Saturday’s opening knockout rounds.
The best non-South Korean archer was Britain’s Larry Godfrey on 680, while the closest team was France, far behind on 2,021.
The Olympic archery is being held at Lord’s cricket ground, where security guards were reportedly forced to turn away spectators hoping to watch the ranking rounds, which are closed to the public.
The confusion apparently arose because the event was officially listed as “non-ticketed”, which some spectators took to mean that it was free to attend.
–IANS/RIA Novosti
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