{"id":14205,"date":"2012-10-07T05:10:48","date_gmt":"2012-10-07T05:10:48","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2012-10-07T05:10:48","modified_gmt":"2012-10-07T05:10:48","slug":"USA-Speedskater-Simon-Cho-admits-to-cheating","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/?p=14205","title":{"rendered":"USA Speedskater Simon Cho admits to cheating"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Olympian short-track speedskater Simon Cho said Friday he agreed to a coach&#8217;s demand to tamper with a Canadian rival&#8217;s skates last year after the command was made a third time and in Korean by Jae Su Chun.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;When he spoke in Korean, I knew he was serious,&#8221; Cho, a fellow South Korean, said Friday at a news conference at his attorney&#8217;s Salt Lake City office.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The repetitiveness and aggressiveness of how he came at me was very intimidating. &#8230; I knew he wasn&#8217;t going to take no for an answer.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Cho said fellow skater Jeff Simon witnessed the first request in English.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Cho also said he would not skate again for Chun, whom he said he personally witnessed douse a skater with water and hit with a notebook.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Cho&#8217;s comments confirmed several allegations made in the arbitration demand that seeks to permanently remove U.S. coach Chun<\/strong>. Chun has denied any wrongdoing but is suspended.<\/p>\n<p>U.S. Speedskating has scheduled a press conference later Friday to discuss the findings of an independent investigation of Chun.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The conduct at issue is repugnant and antithetical to the values of the Olympic Movement and inconsistent with Team USA&#8217;s commitment to fair play,&#8221; Patrick Sandusky, a spokesman for the U.S. Olympic Committee, said in a statement emailed to The Associated Press on Friday morning.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We regret that an American athlete was involved, and intend to actively engage with US Speedskating to ensure that appropriate action is taken.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Cho said he was embarrassed by his actions and called his decision to comply the &#8220;biggest mistake of my life&#8221; and one he regrets.<\/p>\n<p><strong>American Simon Cho becomes World Champ in 500M<\/strong><br \/>\n<iframe width=\"500\" height=\"315\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/evyK3ZiiT7w\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>He also said he apologized to Olivier Jean, whose skates he sabotaged at the 2011 World Team Championship in Poland, in a phone conversation Thursday night.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He sounded personally understanding,&#8221; Cho said of his conversation. <strong>Cho said the tampering occurred after the U.S. team had already been eliminated from competition.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>He maintained Chun was angry at the Canadians and convinced they had aided another team to ensure the U.S. had been eliminated.<\/strong> Cho said the tampering took just a few seconds, and was done with a blade bender normally used to ensure a skater&#8217;s blade follows the proper radius in short track.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I always knew it was wrong that day,&#8221; Cho said. &#8220;I was very scared. I was frightened. And I was intimidated.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><strong>He said Chun at the time said he would take full responsibility if the tampering were ever discovered.<\/strong> But when Cho spoke with him about it a month ago, he said Chun denied any involvement.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Typical skeeve!<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The allegations are part a scandal involving Chun, also accused by a dozen national team members of &#8220;unchecked&#8221; verbal, psychological and physical abuse.<\/p>\n<p>Cho has not signed onto the complaint and continues to skate with the National Racing Program under interim coach Jun Hyung Yeo. But said he would not skate for Chun.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Cho, who turns 21 in a few days, couldn&#8217;t say what would happen with Chun or the other coaches but said he has been &#8220;honest and forthright&#8221; with all investigations.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I hope that I can make up for my mistake and continue to skate in the future,&#8221; said Cho, a 2010 Olympic relay bronze medalist and 2011 individual world champion.<\/p>\n<p>On Sunday, after failing to qualify for the U.S. fall World Cup team, <strong>Cho said he expected to be banned or suspended because of the charges.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Chun&#8217;s attorney, Russell Fericks, did not immediately return an email seeking comment Friday.<\/p>\n<p>But on Thursday he said it was his personal opinion that Cho is &#8220;young and impressionable.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It is sad that he feels compelled to support the irresponsible canard that Coach Chun instructed him to tamper with another skater&#8217;s skate,&#8221; Fericks said.<\/p>\n<p>Cho&#8217;s attorney reiterated Friday that his client acted under great pressure.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He had nothing personally to gain from doing it, and it was an isolated incident completely inconsistent with who Simon is as a person. Simon is admitting his mistake, apologizing to those affected by his actions, and taking responsibility for what he did,&#8221; attorney John Wunderli said.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What about the model minority defense? Would you believe it? I do!<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>Source AP<\/em><br \/>\n<!--break--><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Olympian short-track speedskater Simon Cho said Friday he agreed to a coach&#8217;s demand to tamper with a Canadian rival&#8217;s skates<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":72448,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"magazineBlocksPostFeaturedMedia":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x150.jpg","medium":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","medium_large":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","large":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","1536x1536":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","2048x2048":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-highlighted-post":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-featured-post-medium":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-featured-post-small":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x90.jpg","colormag-featured-image":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-default-news":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x150.jpg","colormag-featured-image-large":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-block-extra-large-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-grid-large-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-grid-small-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-grid-medium-large-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg"},"magazineBlocksPostAuthor":{"name":"Admin","avatar":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/53e6cdc30765aade0129f85e5aeb50124b1d3f5bb9a70373be31e4eb328371e0?s=96&d=mm&r=g"},"magazineBlocksPostCommentsNumber":"0","magazineBlocksPostExcerpt":"Olympian short-track speedskater Simon Cho said Friday he agreed to a coach&#8217;s demand to tamper with a Canadian rival&#8217;s skates","magazineBlocksPostCategories":["News"],"magazineBlocksPostViewCount":125,"magazineBlocksPostReadTime":4,"magazine_blocks_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg",113,170,false],"medium":["https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg",113,170,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x150.jpg",113,150,true]},"magazine_blocks_author":{"display_name":"Admin","author_link":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/?author=1"},"magazine_blocks_comment":0,"magazine_blocks_author_image":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/53e6cdc30765aade0129f85e5aeb50124b1d3f5bb9a70373be31e4eb328371e0?s=96&d=mm&r=g","magazine_blocks_category":"<a href=\"#\" class=\"category-link category-link-1\">News<\/a>","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14205","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14205"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14205\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/72448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}