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South Korean short track speed skater Shim Suk-hee leaves the Korea Skating Union's headquarters in Seoul after attending a disciplinary hearing last Tuesday. (Yonhap) |
South Korean Olympic short track champion Shim Suk-hee has declined to appeal a recent two-month ban, an official confirmed Thursday, though the skater is mulling other options to get herself reinstated for the Beijing Winter Games in February.
The Korea Skating Union (KSU) slapped Shim with the two-month penalty on Dec. 21, over her disparaging remarks on South Korean teammates and coaches in text messages during the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics. Shim had until Wednesday to submit her appeal to the Korean Sport & Olympic Committee (KSOC), and an official from the national Olympic body said Thursday the skater hadn't done so.
A source close to Shim confirmed that the athlete chose not to appeal the ruling with the KSOC but she has not yet given up on her Olympic dreams.
"I can't disclose anything in detail at the moment but we are considering several other options," the source said.
Shim can potentially get the ban reduced or nullified through a court injunction. If not, she may choose to accept the ban and sit out the Beijing Games, which open on Feb. 4.
Time isn't on Shim's side. The deadline to submit Olympic entries is Jan. 24. And even if Shim can win the court battle, she won't be automatically put on the national team.
Shim won the South Korean Olympic trials in May, but she was cut from the national team in October, prior to the International Skating Union (ISU) World Cup season, when her text messages were leaked to media. Without her, other South Korean skaters earned Olympic quotas for the country based on their World Cup performances. And the KSU will now determine which skaters will compete in the Olympics and Shim, who hasn't been competing or training with the rest of the team, may be left off.
Shim was earlier accused of intentionally tripping up a teammate, Choi Min-jeong, during the PyeongChang Olympics. The KSU let her off the hook on those charges, despite their collision in the women's 1,000m final at PyeongChang, but Shim and Choi have yet to mend their fences. Choi has openly called on Shim to stop calling her and texting her trying to apologize. (Yonhap)
