Taiwanese taekwondo competitor Lo Chia-ling (front, second right) shows her silver medal beside her coach Liu Tsung-ta (front, third right) behind a Chinese Taipei (Taiwan) flag in Azerbaijan Monday. Photo courtesy of Liu Tsung-ta
Taiwanese Olympic medalist Lo Chia-ling (羅嘉翎) bagged her second straight silver medal at a world taekwondo championships on Monday in Azerbaijan after falling in the women's under-57kg weight class to a young Hungarian phenom in the finals.
Lo, a bronze medalist at the Tokyo Olympics, had a chance to surpass her silver medal showing at the 2022 world championships in Mexico but could not capitalize on her 10-centimeter height advantage against 17-year-old Hungarian Luana Marton.
Marton, who previously defeated Lo for the gold medal at the 2023 Belgian Open in March, landed a kick to Lo's body for the first points and took the first round 2-1 and then topped Lo 4-3 in the second round to clinch the gold medal in the best-of-three-round contest.
Lo's coach Liu Tsung-ta (劉聰達) praised Marton's defense but thought Lo had more to give.
"Chia-ling's performance was a bit messy. [She] didn't respond after missing [kicks and punches]," Liu said.
Lo had a bit of an adventure just getting to the final, barely squeezing past Laetitia Aoun of Lebanon in the round of 16 with a 6-5 win in the third round.
She then swept two-time Olympic gold medalist Jade Jones of Great Britain in the quarterfinals (8-0, 2-1) before coming back from a round down to upend Hatice Kübra İlgün of Turkey in the semis (4-9, 11-10, 16-3).
Lo also defeated İlgün in the semifinals of last year's world championships in a tight three-round bout before falling in the gold medal round to Luo Zongshi of China in two close rounds.
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