Cha Jun-hwan, who defended his throne with a sore ankle, said, “I will focus on my recovery until the World Championships.”

Cha Jun-hwan (Korea University), the ‘pride of Korean figure skating’ who won the second round of the national team selection despite suffering an ankle injury, announced that he will focus on recovery and participate in the World Championships in top condition .Cha Jun-hwan won the 78th National Men’s and Women’s Figure Skating Comprehensive Championships and National Team 2nd Selection held at the Uijeongbu Indoor Ice Rink in Gyeonggi-do on the 7th with a total score of 275.94 points, winning the right to participate in the World Championships and the Taegeuk Mark for the next season. “I lowered the level of difficulty and focused on stable acting,” he said, and pledged, “I will focus on recovery in the future and participate in international competitions in good physical condition.”

Cha Jun-hwan injured the nerve tissue in his right ankle ahead of the second round of the 2023-2024 International Skating Union (ISU) Senior Grand Prix held in October last year. Condition was not good .I suffered from such extreme pain that it was difficult to even wear skates. Although he gave up participating in the 5th Senior Grand Prix competition and focused on recovery, his physical condition recovered slowly. Despite being in the worst condition, Cha Jun-hwan participated in the first round of national team selection held last month and took first place .Afterwards, I devoted myself to recovery, and entered this competition without fully recovering from my ankle pain. Cha Jun-hwan overcame the aftermath of his injury and the concerns of those around him and gave a clean performance.

He lowered the difficulty of the program by performing only one difficult quadruple jump in the free skating that day, but completed all tasks cleanly .Cha Jun-hwan, whom we met after the game, said, “It was a satisfactory game,” and added, “I will use the remaining time efficiently to restore my previous composition (at the World Championships).” Cha Jun-hwan will participate in the International Skating Union (ISU) Four Continents Championships to be held in Shanghai, China at the end of this month, and then to the ISU World Championships to be held in Montreal, Canada in March .He pledged, “At this World Championships, the right to participate in the next season’s World Championships is at stake, and I want to show my best as it can have an impact on the next season as well.” The World Championships are the second most prestigious international competition after the Olympics.

At the World Championships, there is a quota for each country for the next season’s World Championships .In particular, for competitions held before the Olympic season, Olympic qualification rights are distributed to each country. Cha Jun-hwan became the first Korean male player to win a silver meal in the men’s singles event at the World Championships last season, giving Korea three qualifications .Cha Jun-hwan also expressed his thoughts about winning his 8th consecutive championship .When asked, ‘How did you find motivation in the domestic reality where there are no competitive players?’ Cha Jun-hwan said, “I always had a strong desire to improve and challenge myself. All Korean players train hard. I receive 슬롯게이밍 great energy from them.”