South Huntington 7th Grader Wins Silver In Taekwondo Championship

SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA — Preston Park, a seventh-grader at Stimson Middle School in the South Huntington School District, earned a world silver medal at the 2022 World Taekwondo Poomsae Championships, according to a news release from Double J Ent.

Park, along with partner Julia Cho, of Bayside, competed in cadet pair poomsae. The silver medal they won was the first in Team USA history for the cadet pair division, according to Team USA.

On April 21, Park placed second in the preliminary round of the world-class cadet pair recognized poomsae and advanced to the quarterfinals.

The next day, he and Cho competed against Davya Gavrylov and Yeva Gavrylova of the Ukraine National Team. The duo won and then competed against The Hien Nguyen and Kim Han Trinh of the Vietnam National Team in the semifinals.

Park and Cho fell in the gold medal match against the Chinese Taipei National Team's Bing-Hsuan Yeh and Yu-Jin Chang by 0.14 points, according to Double J Ent.

Team USA finished with three gold medals, eight silver, and 15 bronze medals to finish with the second-highest medal count among all countries for the 2022 World Taekwondo Poomsae Championships. The team finished third in gold medals.

Park is now set to compete in the team trials for 2022 Cadet World Taekwondo Championships in the division of Olympic Sparring on May 28 at Fort Worth, Texas. Park has been invited to the final team trials for the 2022 Cadet World Taekwondo Championships in Bulgaria on July 29 and 30 and the 2022 Pan American Cadet Championships in Costa Rica. He has also been invited to the final team trials for individual poomsae for the 2022 Pan American Cadet Championships in Costa Rica on June 29 and 30.

Preston Park trains at Preston Taekwondo in Melville with his head coach and father, Jay Park.