Thai taekwondo queen Panipak Wongpattanakit: How I became an inspiration in my country

Panipak Wongpattanakit’s victory at the Tokyo Olympics was huge.

It was Thailand’s only gold medal at the Games and she had become the first female taekwondo player from the Far East nation to bag an Olympic title, but it's mainly because of how her self-belief had propelled her to realise the ultimate Olympic dream.

To many, Panipak was the athlete who had no chance to win Olympic gold. When she chose to practise taekwondo, many considered it a waste of time as she was “too weak” and with a body image seemingly unsuitable for the sport.

Just as she did in the dying seconds of the gold medal bout in Tokyo, Panipak maintained her cool and stayed on the mat.

“The night I won the gold medal… became an inspiration for everyone to keep on fighting and to not give up in any situation,” she said in an exclusive interview with Olympics.com after winning her second Grand Prix event of the season in Manchester in October.

Her success has encouraged many in Thailand, where football and volleyball rule, to try taekwondo as she embarks on a journey to win gold one more time at Paris 2024.

• How to qualify for taekwondo at Paris 2024

Panipak on silencing the naysayers

Panipak had her first taste of Olympic glory when she was only 17.

Competing at the second-ever Youth Olympic Games at Nanjing 2014, she clinched the girls' 44kg gold. It was a huge achievement for the Surat Thani native, inducted into sports by her parents who even nicknamed her Tennis.

When the then-nine-year-old chose to follow her brother to practise taekwondo, her decision raised eyebrows.

Despite her tall and lanky figure that has since turned out to be advantageous for scoring sideline kicks, she was deemed “to have a weak build and everything wrong” to make a great taekwondo athlete.

Backed by her family’s support, the three-time world medallist, confidently confronted the prejudices by training even harder.

She proved to be an up-and-coming-young star winning eight of nine international youth events, with the highlight being the 2013 Asian Junior Championships gold medal, a year before she tasted Youth Olympic Games glory in Nanjing.

Her qualification for Rio 2016 Olympics was never in doubt. The target was clear: the gold medal.

She controlled her quarter-final fight but her South Korean opponent Kim So-Hui, the eventual Olympic champion, fired the point-winning blow in the last four seconds of their bout.

It was a crushing and “devastating” defeat.

The bronze medal did little to ease her disappointment. She was finally ready to walk away from taekwondo,

“When I won the bronze medal back then, everyone thought it was a great achievement. But for me, it was a nightmare, a painful moment,” she said in an interview with Thailand’s PBS of that loss that still haunts her.

She could not keep off the mat longer than the two months she went without training.

The Thai taekwondo queen returned to training with her long-time Korean coach Choi Young-Seok, who is now a naturalised Thai, hungrier than ever.

• Panipak Wongpattanakit: I can win another Olympic gold medal in Paris

The Olympic dream

At the Tokyo Games, Panipak realised her dream, clinching gold for her nation that had previously only tasted Olympic success from either boxing or weightlifting.

The 2019 world champion used her height and flexibility to score a late kick against her Spanish opponent Adriana Cerezo Iglesias, who was leading 10-9, for an 11-10 victory in the last five seconds. A memory that still excites her.

“I get delighted whenever I look at the photos of me making history,” she said.

“The Tokyo Olympics was the best memory anyone can imagine… because it was the first gold medal in the Olympic Games for the Thai team, for the taekwondo team.

“The last few seconds of the match were very inspirational. It showed you can succeed no matter how little time is left.

The victory was a big deal back at home and it triggered a huge following for the martial art that was not as “popular as football or volleyball”.

“The medal drew everyone's attention.

"Since the night I won the gold medal, a lot more people have tried taekwondo and I'm also proud to inspire the younger generation… to keep on fighting and not give up in any situation.”

Laser focus on Paris 2024

The Tokyo Olympics gold helped the 25-year-old visualise her career path.

“For the Olympic Games, I want to score as many qualifying points as possible and win another gold medal for Thailand,” she stated firmly.

The three-time Asian champion seems to be on the right path.

Since the Olympics, she has only lost once at the 2022 Asian Championships in Chuncheon. She settled for bronze in South Korea a few weeks after recovering from covid.

“I was hospitalised for 10 days, and I regressed a lot as I stopped training. Things went downhill and it became harder to finally adapt and improve myself when I returned to training.”

The reigning Southeast Asian Games gold medallist recently won her seventh and eighth Grand Prix titles in Paris and Manchester, and she is the one to beat at the World Championships in Guadalajara before embarking on the chase for her third Grand Slam gold medal in Saudi Arabia in December.

Panipak is staying laser-focused on her short- and long-term targets.

"The World Championships in Mexico is one of the big matches with a chance to score high points and enter the Olympics ranked in the top five of the world.”

Despite her dazzling record, the world number one who is touted for her “perfect kick to the back of the opponent’s head, and effective with her body attacks” still feels she is far from her ideal golden shape.

“I could be better. I made a lot of mistakes that need to be adjusted to comply with these new rules. I'll have to work on my roundhouse kicks and learn about my competitors who are rising athletes.”