Father and daughter each hold 2 Asian Games golds and an Olympic medal

Yeo Seo-jeong competes in her first vault attempt during the women's vault final at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games at Nagoya Gymnasium Rainbow Hall in Nagoya, Japan, on Thursday. [Yonhap]
Yeo Seo-jeong competes in her first vault attempt during the women's vault final at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games at Nagoya Gymnasium Rainbow Hall in Nagoya, Japan, on Thursday. [Yonhap]

South Korea's top women's artistic gymnast, Yeo Seo-jeong, 24, of Jecheon City Hall, reclaimed the Asian Games women's vault title after an eight-year gap Thursday, giving her the same two Asian Games gold medals as her father, Yeo Hong-cheol, executive director of the Korea Gymnastics Association.

Yeo topped a field of eight in the women's vault final at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games at Nagoya Gymnasium in Aichi Prefecture, Japan, averaging 14.483 points across her two vaults.

Having won gold at the 2018 Jakarta-Palembang Games, she claimed her second Asian Games gold medal in the event. She is the first South Korean female artistic gymnast to win two Asian Games gold medals.

She did not compete at the 2022 Hangzhou Games, held in 2023, because she was competing at the World Championships, where a berth in the team event at the 2024 Paris Olympics was at stake.

The victory also gave the father-daughter pair a shared distinction. Yeo Hong-cheol, a legend of South Korean men's vault, won back-to-back Asian Games titles in the men's event at the 1994 Hiroshima and 1998 Bangkok Games. With his daughter now claiming vault gold in 2018 and again Thursday, both hold two Asian Games golds apiece.

The pair have also stood on the Olympic podium together. Yeo Hong-cheol won silver in vault at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, while Yeo Seo-jeong took bronze at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics — becoming the first South Korean female artistic gymnast to win an Olympic medal.

Yeo Seo-jeong of South Korea celebrates with the national flag after winning the gold medal in the women's vault final at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games at Nagoya Gymnasium Rainbow Hall in Nagoya, Japan, on Thursday. [Yonhap]
Yeo Seo-jeong of South Korea celebrates with the national flag after winning the gold medal in the women's vault final at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games at Nagoya Gymnasium Rainbow Hall in Nagoya, Japan, on Thursday. [Yonhap]

Yeo, who had qualified first for the final, dominated the competition — the only finalist to average above 14 points across both vaults.

In her first attempt, she successfully executed the "Yeo 2," a high-difficulty skill her father developed during his competitive career. The move involves pushing off the vault table, extending the body and twisting through two and a half rotations in the air. She scored 14.466 points, with a difficulty value of 5.4 and an execution score of 9.266.

Her second vault, with a difficulty value of 5.0, earned her 14.100 points and sealed the gold.

North Korea's An Chang-ok, the 2022 Hangzhou Games gold medalist, was deducted 0.3 points after her left leg stepped outside the mat on the landing of her second vault, leaving her with an average of 13.666 points and the silver medal.

Yeo's gold was the South Korean gymnastics team's first medal of the Games and the country's 10th gold overall.


yjc@heraldcorp.com