London, England – China roared past South Korea and the tough-lucked Shin A Lam in Saturday's women's team epee final, while the United States captured bronze.
Shin was looking at a chance for gold after suffering a loss in the semifinals of the women's individual epee tournament to Germany's Britta Heidemann due to a clock malfunction.
Following the defeat, Shin sat down on the piste in tears and refused to leave before eventually being persuaded to leave. Although the decision was not overturned, the International Fencing Federation did announce earlier this week that she would be offered a special medal for "aspiration to win and respect for the rules."
Shin also lost her bronze medal match in the individual draw, but had another chance to win gold on Saturday. She led off the gold medal bout with China by scoring three touches to Li Na's one and Korea drew an early lead.
However, the match was tied by the time Shin took her second turn and she was outtouched 3-1 by Xu Anqi as China went ahead by two. It never looked back and eventually scored a 39-25 win, with 19-year-old London Olympics bronze medalist Sun Yujie scoring 18 touches, including 12 versus Shin in the final round.
"We have played each other a few times already so we are familiar with each other. It felt very good. We played our normal game. There weren't any problems," said China's Xu Anqi.
"We had more patience."
The loss did provide a bit of redemption for Shin, who will at least take home a silver medal.
"In the individual event I didn't get the medal, whatever the reason was," the Korean said. "But tonight I managed to get this silver medal which is very special also because it comes from the strength of all our team. And I'm extremely happy for it."
The eighth-seeded Koreans were coming off a 45-36 win over the U.S. to get into the final and the Americans pulled out a 31-30 win over second-seeded Russia to win the bronze medal.
After Maya Lawrence outtouched Lyubov Shutova 4-2 to put the U.S. ahead by two, Russia's Anna Sivkova got the better of Courtney Hurley in the final duel to even things up, scoring five touches to Hurley's three.
The two then squared off in overtime, with Hurley securing the winning touch 16 seconds in.
"The team came together perfectly. I can't believe how well it all came together," said American Kelly Hurley, Courtney's sister and teammate. "It's like a dream come true. It's like it's not happening. It's the best moment of my life so far. We have a medal. It's awesome."
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