Day: May 22, 2022

Taiwan's Chiu Yi-ching (???) bagged a bronze medal in the first Archery World Cup event of her career, the women's individual recurve event at the 2022 Hyundai Archery World Cup event in Gwangju, South Korea, on Sunday.

The 18-year-old Chiu defeated compatriot Kuo Tzu-ying (???) 6-2 in the bronze medal match, after losing in the semifinals to Lee Gahyun of South Korea 6-2.

Kuo, 19, reached the semifinals by defeating Taiwanese Olympian Lei Chien-ying (???) 6-5 in a one-arrow tiebreaker, but then was shut out by top seed South Korean Choi Misun, who eventually won the women's individual recurve event.

The World Cup event in Gwangju was the second stage of a four-stage World Cup tour that will culminate in the World Cup Final in Mexico in October.

Kuo and Chiu are both representing Taiwan on the World Cup tour for the first time this year, and compete using the recurve bow, which is the bow used in Olympic competition.

Chiu did not compete in the first World Cup stage in Antalya, Turkey, in April, while Kuo was the fourth best qualifier and reached the quarterfinals in her World Cup debut before falling to Laura Van der Winkel of the Netherlands 6-5 in a tiebreaker.

Chiu's medal was the second won by Taiwan in Gwangju after the mixed compound bow team took gold on Saturday.

The men's recurve team, which won gold in Antalya behind Olympians Tang Chih-chun (???) and Wei Chun-heng (???) and newcomer Su Yu-yang (???), was ousted by the United States 5-4 in the second round of the men's team event in Gwangju.

The seasoned veteran Wei was replaced on the team in Gwangju by 19-year-old Tai Yu-hsuan.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

The manager of Ukraine's men's national basketball team, who recently ended a visit to Taiwan, has returned to Europe and is working on bringing the team to Taiwan to train for upcoming games, according to the P. LEAGUE+'s Kaohsiung Steelers on Sunday.

The Steelers, who hosted Ukraine men's basketball team manager Andrii Lebediev during his visit, said in a statement that Lebediev is in contact with agencies in Taiwan to work out details of the plan to have his team train in Taiwan.

Lebediev came to Taiwan on a business visa between April 5 and May 17 at the invitation of the Steelers to facilitate professional exchanges between the two parties on sports club management and training.

During his visit, Lebediev said at a press conference on April 30 in Kaohsiung that he hoped to bring 14 players to Taiwan to train for games in the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 European qualifying tournament.

Ukraine is scheduled to play against Georgia on July 1 and North Macedonia on July 4 in the third window of the FIBA World Cup European qualifiers.

Lebediev said that bringing the team to Taiwan will help his players get a small respite from the constant stress they have faced over the Russian invasion of their country.

That may not happen according to plan, however.

In a telephone interview with CNA, Lee Yun-hsiang (???), secretary-general of Taiwan's Chinese Taipei Basketball Association, said Sunday that Taiwan proposed an alternative to the Ukrainian national team about two weeks ago.

It asked that the team visit Taiwan in early August to play in the William Jones Cup rather than come in late May as has been speculated to prepare for its upcoming qualifiers.

Lee cited the current surge of domestic COVID-19 infections in Taiwan as a possible risk for the Ukrainian national team, which could jeopardize their participation in the European qualifiers in July if any of their players were to get infected.

An August visit would also give government agencies in Taiwan time to prepare for their arrival, such as coming up with disease prevention plans and the needed funding, as the Ukrainians are hoping that Taiwan will pay for all of their expenses during their visit, Lee said.

Lee said the association is still waiting for the Ukrainian national team's response.

The Ukrainian men's national basketball team was competing in the FIBA World Cup European qualifiers in Spain and played against Spain in Córdoba on Feb. 24, the day Russia invaded their country.

The team then traveled to Latvia, where its coach Ainars Bagatskis is from, and stayed there. Some of the team's members have since returned to their respective clubs around Europe.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

State-run Taiwan Power Co. (Taipower) said Sunday that from June 1, electric car owners will be charged a flat-rate NT$262.50 (US$8.82) monthly fee for household electricity, as well as a varying per-kilowatt-hour (KWh) surcharges.

The new rates, which Taipower said were designed to encourage off-peak charging, would apply to the registered residential addresses of Taiwan's 10,000 or so electric car owners, as well as to public charging points, the company said.

Taipower said that in addition to the NT$262.50 monthly fee, electric car owners would also be charged a per-kilowatt surcharge of NT$34.6 between October and May, and NT$47.2 between June and September.

In an effort to lessen the strain on the nation's power grid, Taipower said it would also be imposing variable demand surcharges on electric car owners.

From October to May, electric car owners will be charged an extra NT8.13 per KWh of electricity used between 3 p.m. and 9 p.m., with the surcharge dropping to NT$1.95 outside of these hours.

However, during the high electricity consumption months from June to September, these surcharges will increase to NT$8.35 per KWh between 4 p.m. and 10 p.m., and NT$2.05 per KWh outside of these hours, according to Taipower.

The company said it hoped the new rates would encourage the nation's electric car owners to charge their vehicles outside of times of peak demand.

The new rates, which have already been approved by the Ministry of Economic Affairs, will be officially announced on May 25 and rolled out beginning June 1, the company added.

Taipower explained that it had introduced the new charges in light of the noticeable growth in the sales of electric cars across Taiwan, and the subsequent increase in demand for electricity.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel

The Taipei-based TaiwanBeer HeroBears have clinched the last spot in the four-team T1 LEAGUE playoffs after storming past the Taoyuan Leopards 128-110 in a play-in game Sunday.

The fourth-seeded HeroBears had a built-in advantage going into the play-in series, having only to win one game to advance to the playoff semifinals, while the fifth-seeded Leopards had to win two in a row to reach the final four.

The HeroBears made sure that the series did not go down to a final elimination game in Taoyuan Arena as six of its players scored in double digits, led by small forward Tyler Lamb and center Diamond Louis Stone with 31 points each.

The Leopards, who finished the regular season with an 8-22 record, eight games beyond the HeroBears, stayed close most of the way and only trailed 107-101 with just over 7 minutes left in the game.

But the HeroBears put the game away with a 14-2 run during which they went 4-4 from the floor, including two threes, and hit four straight free throws.

The Taipei-based team will next play the top-seeded Kaohsiung Aquas, while the second-seeded Taichung Wagor Suns will face against the third-seeded New Taipei CTBC DEA in the opening round of the playoffs.

After the game, HeroBears head coach Yang Chih-hao (???) said his team will be spending the next two days preparing for their match-up with the Aquas at Kaohsiung Fengshan Stadium on Wednesday.

"Our players are quite familiar with the Aquas. Some of our players have played them before in the Super Basketball League," Yang said.

His team will focus their preparations on the Aquas' two biggest stars -- point guard Jason Brickman, who leads the league with 10.3 assists per game, and center Mindaugas Kupšas, who is known to dominate in the paint.

The semifinals were originally set up as best-of-five series but have been shortened to best-of-three series in the wake of the latest COVID-19 outbreak, and the finals have been cut down to a best-of-five series from the original best-of-seven format.

Source: Focus Taiwan News Channel