Sharp shooters from the host South Korea will gun for the first medal of the 17th Asian Games when the competition gets underway in earnest on Saturday.

The Asiad’s opening ceremony is set for Friday. Though preliminary football matches will be played between Sunday and Thursday, the event’s first medals will be up for grabs on Saturday.

According to the Incheon organizers, 18 of the 439 gold medals will be won on Saturday: Four each from judo and shooting, two each from weightlifting, cycling, fencing and wushu, and one apiece from equestrian and synchronized swimming.

The first medal will come from the shooting range.

The preliminary round for the women’s 10 m air pistol will start at 8 a.m. at Ongnyeon International Shooting Range. Kim Jang-mi, the reigning Olympic champ in the 25 m pistol, leads a South Korean contingent of three shooters.

The team medals will be awarded based on the total points of three shooters for each country in the preliminary stage. The opening phase is scheduled to end at 8:50 a.m.

Should the female shooters fail to reach the podium, their male counterparts will have the chance to win the first medal when they take to the line in the 50 m pistol at 9:30 a.m. The three-time Olympic pistol champ Jin Jong-oh headlines a South Korean trio.

The final for the women’s 10 m air pistol starts at 10 a.m., and the final for the men’s 50 m pistol begins at 12:15 p.m., setting up the host country for a potential gold rush on the opening day.

There will be more potential medal events for the host in the afternoon on Saturday. The team dressage event in equestrian will wrap up around 6 p.m., and South Korea is the heavy favorite. The country has won five of the six Asiad gold medals awarded so far in team dressage.

In cycling, the men’s and the women’s will chase medals in the team sprint events, scheduled to end around 7 p.m.

Judokas and fencers will hope to deliver more medal news in the evening hours. Kim Won-jin in the men’s 60 kg judo, the 2013 world bronze medalist, is a medal favorite.

In fencing, Kim Ji-yeon, the 2012 Olympic gold medalist in the women’s sabre, is favored to win her first Asiad gold. Jung Jun-sun and Park Kyoung-doo could set up an all-South Korean gold medal bout in the men’s epee. The fencing competition is scheduled to finish around 8:30 p.m. (Yonhap)



South Korea will have its largest-ever Asiad delegation with 831 athletes and 237 officials. The host will participate in all 36 sports and aims to win at least 90 gold medals to finish second in the medal table for the fifth straight Asiad.

China has topped the medal standings in every Asian Games since 1982. (Yonhap)