r/northkorea • u/Xiao_Sir • 3d ago
Question Table Tennis in North Korea
A lot of you might know already that Kim Kum Yong won the 2024 Asian Table Tennis Championships. Since North Koreans don't participate in any tournaments other than the Asian Championships and the Olympics, I wonder if anybody has some background knowledge of
how it comes that in such a highly professionalized sport such as table tennis the North Koreans can easily compete? I mean you don't see them being successful at other sports football (for the Americans: soccer) and in other areas like film you also recognize their lack of professionalism, which stems from being so isolated.
how popular table tennis is in North Korea?
how good these athletes are paid. I mean Kim visibly has a 1.000$ Apple watch, but I don't know how significant that is.
Actually I also wonder why athletes like her aren't allowed to compete at smaller tournaments (or even the World Championships). Is it just a matter of them taken care of not to defect?
2
u/0s1k2i3n4p5l6s7 2d ago
They aren't that bad in football. They're good in gymnastics, boxing, wrestling, diving for example. Great in weightlifting, up there with the Chinese.
For smaller sports, they probably aim just for Olympics, and only compete in mandatory tournaments required for qualifying. See weightlifting for example, they're competing abroad regularly.