Lee Ri-young (23, Busan Swimming Federation) and Heo Yun-seo (18, Apgujeong High School) secured the right to participate in the 2024 Paris Olympics.It has been 12 years since the sisters Park Hyun-sun and Park Hyun-ha at the 2012 London Games that Korean athletes have appeared on the Olympic stage in artistic swimming.An official from the Korea Aquatics Federation said on the 12th, “Korea Artistic Swimming has won the right to advance to the Paris Olympics in the duet event. It was confirmed today.”National team leader Kim Hyo-mi said in a phone call with Yonhap News that day, “The latest information regarding qualification for the Paris Olympics was updated today. I was anxious, but I heard good news.” Heo Yoon-seo and Lee Ri-young also wrote on social networking services (SNS), “We will be participating in the Paris Olympics. Thank you to the coaches and everyone who supported us.” The two also expressed their gratitude to each other.
18 teams will participate in the artistic swimming duet competition at the Paris Olympics.The 10 countries that qualified for the team event and the 5 duet teams that won the continental championship received the right to participate first, and the three remaining tickets were distributed according to the results of the 2024 Doha World Championships.As the 10 countries competing in the team event and the duet winning the continental championship overlapped, 6 teams actually qualified for the duet event at the Paris Olympics through the results of the Doha World Championships.Korea, played by Lee Ri-young and Heo Yoon-seo, also became one of the six teams that secured qualification through the Doha World Championships.Lee Ri-young and Heo Yoon-seo Australia, Canada, Egypt, France, Italy, Japan, Mexico, China, Spain, USA (participating in both team and duet events), Austria, New Zealand, UK, Netherlands, Greece, Israel, Ukraine (participating in duet events) will compete with the duo at the Paris Olympics. Their performance at the Doha World Championships led to their participation in the Paris Olympics.Lee Ri-young and Heo Yun-seo placed 10th in the duet technical final at the Doha World Championships.
This is Korea’s best achievement in this event since the 2007 Melbourne Games, when the World Aquatics Championships divided the women’s artistic swimming duet event into technical and free.The previous highest ranking in this event was Lee Ri-young and Heo Yun-seo’s 12th place in Budapest in 2022.Lee Ri-young and Heo Yun-seo also advanced to the finals of the World Championships in the duet free for the first time in Korean artistic history and ranked 10th.Lee Ri-young and Heo Yoon-seo, who have opened the door to the Olympics, will soon resume training to show more elaborate and spectacular performances in Paris.Leader Kim Hyo-mi said, “After Lee Lee-young and Heo Yun-seo placed 4th at the Hangzhou Asian Games last fall, we focused on technical training to avoid receiving base marks (lowest score per technical element). In terms of completeness in performing techniques at the Doha competition, “There was definitely improvement,” he said.He emphasized, “For the Paris Olympics, we plan to revise the work so that it can perform at a higher level of difficulty,” and added, “We will also pay attention to the artistic aspect and strike a balance between the two categories (art score and performance score).”Lee Ri-young wrote on 슬롯게이밍 Heo Yoon-seo’s SNS, “We’re starting again.”