North Korean pair team of Ryom/Kim qualify for the Olympics in South Korea (NYT articles)

[Sylvia]

THREE articles by the New York Times' veteran sports reporter Jeré Longman -- this one was published after Ryom Tae-ok and Kim Ju-sik qualified a spot for PyeongChang: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/29/sports/olympics/north-korea-olympics-nuclear-tension.html
Excerpt:

When the skaters were asked minutes after Friday’s performance if they hoped to compete at the Games, their coach, Kim Hyon-son, stepped in and said, “It is up to the North Korean Olympic Committee to decide whether they will participate or not.”
The North Koreans appeared relaxed and open — to a point — at a second meeting with reporters after the competition here, the Nebelhorn Trophy, but requested that no questions be asked about the Olympics. Their reluctance probably stemmed from the fact that the decision will not be theirs, said Bruno Marcotte, a prominent French Canadian coach who also works with the skaters.
“It’s out of their hands,” he said.

Before the start of Nebelhorn Trophy: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/27/sports/olympics/north-korea-winter-olympics.html

An obscure competition on Thursday and Friday here in Bavaria has gained geopolitical urgency as the pairs team of Ryom Tae-ok and Kim Ju-sik seek to become the first North Korean athletes to qualify for the 2018 Winter Olympics in February in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
“We’re aware there is a lot of interest,” Kim Hyon-son, who coaches the pair, said after a training session on Wednesday, speaking briefly through an interpreter.

From mid-June through mid-August, the North Korean pair of Ms. Ryom, 18, and Mr. Kim, 25, trained in Montreal, refining their attempt to claim one of five Olympic spots available here at this week’s Nebelhorn Trophy competition.
The skaters, their coach and a North Korean skating official spoke frequently about the Olympics, said Bruno Marcotte, a prominent French Canadian coach who worked with the pair.
“All the time they would ask me: ‘Do you think we have a chance to qualify? Are we good enough? What do we need to qualify?’” Mr. Marcotte said of the pair, who aspire to become one of the world’s top 10 teams.
“They didn’t want to talk about politics,” said Mr. Marcotte, who is also here assisting the North Koreans. “It was all about sport and being the first ones in the Olympics and breaking barriers and doing their best.”

Longman's personal account: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/27/insider/north-koreas-athletic-ambassadors.html
Excerpt from the end:

Throughout my experiences with North Koreans, I’ve found one thing holds steady: Although the North Korean government has succeeded in making its citizens seem abstract to the outside world, casual meetings with athletes and officials can reveal more similarities than differences.
In the words of Alexander Johnson, an American skater who watched the North Koreans train on Wednesday night: “They’re just people.”

Photos of them, both on- and off-ice, by Jun Michael Park are included in all 3 articles.

 

[bardtoob]

Well, you would think NK would be good at pairs skating. They have some amazing unison in their Mass Games.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20kj_dClGXo

I suppose the problem would be getting good technical coaching.

 

[Sylvia]

North Korea missed an Oct. 31 deadline to accept invitations from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and South Korea to join the Games. But Games officials have said the North could wait until shortly before the Games to say whether it will join.

Source is a Reuters article published today: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...-sport-could-be-making-of-games-idUSKBN1D612K

ETA: http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/search1/2603000000.html?cid=AEN20171103006100315

North Korea's pairs figure skating tandem Ryom Tae-ok and Kim Ju-sik in September gained qualification for next year's Winter Olympics in South Korea. A local broadcaster reported last month that North Korea expressed its intent to join the competition to the International Skating Union.
"It has been identified that the report is not true," Lee Eugene, vice spokesperson at the ministry, said at a regular press briefing.
Lee said that Pyongyang could participate in the PyeongChang Olympics if it expresses its intent by the end of December when qualification spots will be re-allocated.

The relevant deadlines, as specified by the ISU's Olympic qualification document, were/are:

Confirm: 30 October 2017
NOCs qualified through the OWG Qualifying Competition 2017 to confirm use of allocated quota places to ISU
...
Reallocation: 13-21 December 2017
ISU to inform relevant NOCs regarding reallocation of quota places that will have to be confirmed by the NOC within 24 hours. Lack of a NOC response to the ISU within this deadline will be considered as a refusal of the offered quota place

 

[eurodance2001]

Just accept the damn spot already and be done.. Everything always with an extra layer of drama..

 

[chattila]

Ryom/Kim are competing at the Olympics, right? What more do the PDRK's ISU leaders want?

 

[Tinami Amori]

Ryom/Kim are competing at the Olympics, right? What more do the PDRK's ISU leaders want?

to "moon" the world.. https://i.pinimg.com/736x/d9/cc/2a/d9cc2aa85cf49d115de67c9e8494b501--movie-stars-funny-cards.jpg

 

[VGThuy]

Sad news, it seems like they gave up their spot to Japan.

http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2017/12/01/2017120101158.html

According to the Korea Skating Union on Thursday, Ryom Tae-ok, 18, and Kim Ju-sik, 25, had not signed up for the Pyeongchang Olympics as of Oct. 30, the International Skating Union's deadline for Olympic registration for skaters who earned Olympic berths at the Nebelhorn Trophy event in September.

Ryom and Kim claimed one of the last four Olympic berths for the pair skating event by scoring 180.09 points overall at the Nebelhorn Trophy.

"Not submitting an application to the ISU is usually interpreted as forfeiting the spot," a KSU official said.

. . .

According to NBC, which owns the rights to broadcast the Pyeongchang Olympics, the North Koreans' spot has been given to Japan, which is required to notify the ISU of their intention to participate by Dec. 21.

 

[meggonzo]

 

[Lara]

 

[Frau Muller]

Not a good development. No disrespect to the Japanese pair team.

 

[quartz]

Noooooo! I really like them and it would have been such an amazing Olympic story - all that triumphing over adversity thing. And they seem such charming, genuine people, the kind I really like to cheer for.

 

[Willin]

Can anyone explain why the spot went to Japan instead of the US? Does it go off of Nebelhorn instead of Worlds?

It's too bad that they couldn't go. I was so excited to see them skate!

 

[Vagabond]

I haven't ready anything as shocking here on FSU since I opened this thread.

 

[Sylvia]

The end of the Chosun article linked above states:

North Korea's only remaining route to the Olympics, which start in February, would be through a wild card granted by the International Olympic Committee. The IOC intends to get North Korea to join the event with the hope of staging an "Olympics for Peace."

This Reuters article was published back on Nov. 17 with quotes from Bruno Marcotte when he was coaching at Warsaw Cup: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...kating-pair-are-a-rough-diamond-idUSKBN1DH1RP

ETA:

Can anyone explain why the spot went to Japan instead of the US? Does it go off of Nebelhorn instead of Worlds?

Yes.

Longer article (Nov. 26) about Marcotte's role with the North Korean pair plus video: https://globalnews.ca/news/3879376/north-korean-figure-skaters-olympics-canadian-coach/

It’s uncommon, but not unheard-of for North Koreans to visit Canada. According to Citizenship and Immigration Canada, 15 visas were issued between January and September 2017. Four of these would have been the figure skating team.
The group enjoyed Montreal, said Marcotte, and liked to see the Canada Day celebrations. “They were there during Canada Day and the guy, he was talking about Justin Trudeau.”
“He was like, ‘I like this man.’ He was talking about how he really likes Justin Trudeau, which was of course very funny.”

He’s not sure that being an international-level athlete necessarily means a better life back home for them. He imagines that in North Korea, you have to have a good life already to be able to figure skate.
Mostly, said Marcotte, the North Koreans wanted to be seen as athletes – not as political figures. “Every time I spoke to them, they always made sure that they never wanted me to feel and confuse politics with sport. And they always wanted to make sure that I saw them as sportsmen and not as political representatives.”
That was fine by him: “Me, I don’t teach for politics.”

 

[misskarne]

Can anyone explain why the spot went to Japan instead of the US? Does it go off of Nebelhorn instead of Worlds?

Yes. The US missed out. They weren't good enough at Worlds. Can we please stop with the trying to mess with the process just because the US pairs weren't good enough?

 

[Willin]

@misskarne It was a legitimate question. I agree the US pairs weren't good enough.

I genuinely didn't know what the replacement process was in the situation where the US technically should've gotten two spots due to a total placement of 28 but missed that second spot on a technicality. Again, I don't think US pairs deserves the second spot, but technically they did meet the requirements to get a second spot.

 

[misskarne]

I genuinely didn't know what the replacement process was in the situation where the US technically should've gotten two spots due to a total placement of 28 but missed that second spot on a technicality. Again, I don't think US pairs deserves the second spot, but technically they did meet the requirements to get a second spot.

IMO, they should have got France's unused spot. I would have been 110% fine with that. But they didn't, and the North Korea spot is a Nebelhorn spot, and not for the US to touch.

 

[Jeschke]

Yes. The US missed out. They weren't good enough at Worlds. Can we please stop with the trying to mess with the process just because the US pairs weren't good enough?

Muhaha, you complaining about others complaining too much about one topic. I can't!

 

[Jeschke]

On a serious note: I am sad for the PRK team; it was fun to watch them at Nebelhorn.
Personally I am no fan of seeing JPN#2 at olympics, but that's the game. A shame for BLR, who had a great outing and were beaten by a nose by a JPN team, who cannot go

 

[SmallFairy]

I so wished they would get the chance to compete in Korea! I really like them, and the joy they show when they're competing. Blah! Lousy federation.

 

[zebobes]

I don't think it's the federation's fault they aren't competing, it's more likely something that comes from higher up. Without a North Korean pair competing at the Olympics, you have to be worried about what the North Korean government thinks about the Olympics, and why they aren't willing to let their pair compete.

 

[allezfred]

North Korea also boycotted the 1988 Seoul Olympics. This was not unexpected.

 

[Stephanie]

It just seems strange that they would spend all of the money to go to Canada to train and to go to Nebelhorn and then forfeit the spot

Really too bad for the skaters

 

[clairecloutier]

It just seems strange that they would spend all of the money to go to Canada to train and to go to Nebelhorn and then forfeit the spot

I think they were keeping their options open by sending Ryom/Kim to Canada and Nebelhorn. But politics have now led them in another direction. I'm sorry for Ryom/Kim--and worried what it could indicate, politically.

 

[chattila]

I think they were keeping their options open by sending Ryom/Kim to Canada and Nebelhorn. But politics have now led them in another direction. I'm sorry for Ryom/Kim--and worried what it could indicate, politically.

I agree. That's my worry. What's the date for the Opening Ceremonies in Pyeongchang?

 

[skatingguy]

I agree. That's my worry. What's the date for the Opening Ceremonies in Pyeongchang?

February 9th, 2018

 

[chattila]

February 9th, 2018

Thanks. Zero Hour (but hopefully it will pass without incident).

 

[Rock2]

I'm joining the paranoid parade, especially if this pairs team was to be the only reps of NK at the Olympics (is that true?). I've had a sick feeling about these Olympics for a year now, to be honest.

Add this apparent 'administrative error' to RUS (a big ally of NK) managing to get itself booted from the Olympics and, oh, did you hear/see the missile NK just unveiled? Bigger than anyone thought. They are now all set.

If RUS does not go to the Olympics I'm officially sweating through my clothes. And then if China weighs in and somehow passes on the games you can find me outside with a shovel digging a bunker.

 

[GarrAargHrumph]

These concerns are part of the reason why tickets and hotel rooms for these games aren't selling well. People are worried. It's understandable - and might also be an opportunity for those who might otherwise not be able to get tickets.

 

[Frau Muller]

Being close to the DMZ, I’m guessing that Pyeongchang has many bunkers and fortified areas where athletes, visitors and citizens could shelter in case an imminent missile launch is detected. I’m guessing that NBC has a tremendous fortified shelter for Bob Costas and the crew (Johnny, Tara et al). Heaven forbid that something will happen but I’ve no doubt that safety measures are in place.