List of Olympic medalists in taekwondo
Games Gold Silver Bronze
2000 Sydney details Chen Zhong ( CHN ) Natalia Ivanova ( RUS ) Dominique Bosshart ( CAN )
2004 Athens details Chen Zhong ( CHN ) Myriam Baverel ( FRA ) Adriana Carmona ( VEN )
2008 Beijing details María Espinoza ( MEX ) Nina Solheim ( NOR ) Sarah Stevenson ( GBR ) Natália Falavigna ( BRA )
2012 London details Milica Mandić ( SRB ) Anne-Caroline Graffe ( FRA ) Anastasia Baryshnikova ( RUS ) María Espinoza ( MEX )
2016 Rio details Zheng Shuyin ( CHN ) María Espinoza ( MEX ) Bianca Walkden ( GBR ) Jackie Galloway ( USA )
Women -- Heavyweight ( +67 kg )
Taekwondo is an Olympic sport that is contested at the Summer Olympic Games. It was introduced in the 1988 and 1992 Olympic Games as a demonstration sport, and made its debut as a full medal sport at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia. Both men and women compete in four events each defined by separate weight classes: flyweight, featherweight, middleweight and heavyweight. Traditionally, taekwondo competitions consist of eight weight classes for each gender, but Olympic taekwondo only have four due to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) limiting the total number of taekwondo entrants to 128. The competitions are conducted in accordance with the rules established by the World Taekwondo (WT). The competition format for taekwondo is a single-elimination tournament to determine the gold and silver medal winners, and a repechage is used to determine the bronze medal winner(s). in 2000 and 2004, a single repechage final determined the sole bronze medal winner, but a rule change in 2008 created two repechage finals that allowed for the bronze medal to be shared between two competitors. Iranian Hadi Saei (2 gold, 1 bronze), American Steven López (2 gold, 1 bronze), South Korean Hwang Kyung-Seon (2 gold, 1 bronze) and Mexican María del Rosario Espinoza (1 gold, 1 silver, 1 bronze) share the most medals in Taekwondo with three. By defending her title at 2012 London Olympics, Hwang Kyung-Seon became the first woman ever to win three Olympic taekwondo medals. Hadi Saei and Steven López, along with Huang Chih-hsiung of Chinese Taipei, are the only three athletes to have won medals in multiple weight classes. Taiwanese Chi Shu-ju is the youngest athlete to win a medal (17 years, 10 months, 1 day) and Hadi Saei is the oldest (32 years, 2 months, 13 days). Rohullah Nikpai of Afghanistan became his country's first ever Olympic medalist with a bronze medal in 2008.