Kuo Hsing-chun

30-second overview: Kuo Hsing-chun was born in 1993 in Luodong, Yilan, and is a descendant of the Amis Malan community¹. The most successful weightlifter in Taiwan’s history, she has broken world records 11 times over her career². At the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, she won gold with a total of 236 kg, setting three Olympic records³. At the 2024 Paris Olympics, she competed while injured and won bronze, becoming the first Taiwanese athlete to reach the podium in three consecutive Olympic Games⁴. Off the platform, she is known for donating an ambulance, prize money, and establishing a foundation, with a long-term commitment to sports resources in rural and underserved areas.

In September 2014, inside the weightlifting training room at the National Sports Training Center, a 141-kilogram barbell slipped from Kuo Hsing-chun’s hands and crashed directly onto her right thigh. Her vastus lateralis muscle was torn by 70 to 80 percent⁵. She lay on the floor and waited a long time before an ambulance arrived. In the midst of the pain, the question that surfaced in her mind was far beyond her own body: if this had happened in a Taitung tribal community, how long would it take for an ambulance to arrive?

Two years later, she used prize money to buy an ambulance and donated it to Penghu Huimin Hospital⁶.

Born in Luodong, Malan by Blood

Kuo Hsing-chun was not born in Taitung. She was born on November 26, 1993, at St. Mary’s Hospital in Luodong Township, Yilan County. At birth, she was in breech position with the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck, and nearly did not survive. The character “婞” in her name carries the meaning of “survival by fortune”¹. Her family’s Amis roots are in the Malan community in Taitung. Her great-grandmother Lu Ching-tzu was a Golden Melody Award winner known for traditional Amis songs⁷. Two generations, the same Malan bloodline: one heard by the world through song, the other through the barbell.

Kuo grew up in a single-parent household; her mother worked in restaurants to support the family. Kuo attended elementary school in Yilan, then transferred in junior high to National Taitung University Affiliated Physical Education Senior High School. She originally trained in track and field, in shot put and discus. The key figure in her move to weightlifting was coach Pu Ya-ling, who saw in training that Kuo’s explosiveness should not be wasted on throwing events⁸. Later, national team coach Lin Ching-neng took over her technical training, guiding her from national competitions onto the world stage⁹.

The Day 141 Kilograms Came Down

At the 2012 London Olympics, 18-year-old Kuo Hsing-chun stood on the Olympic stage for the first time and finished eighth in the 58 kg class². The result was not especially prominent, but reaching the Olympics at 18 made the future look wide open.

Then, in 2014, that barbell came crashing down.

Her right vastus lateralis muscle was torn by 70 to 80 percent. For a weightlifter, the thigh is the foundation that bears all weight; this injury was almost equivalent to a retirement sentence. Rehabilitation began with the most basic movements: learning how to walk normally. It would be several months before she could lift a barbell again⁵.

“I had to wait this long for an ambulance at the National Training Center. What would happen if it were my hometown, or somewhere even more remote?”⁶

That sentence later became action. In January 2016, Kuo donated NT$1.5 million to purchase an ambulance for Penghu Huimin Hospital⁶. It was not an impulsive reaction after being injured. She spent more than a year thinking about it, and did it once she had the means.

From Rio to Tokyo: A Record Machine

At the 2016 Rio Olympics, Kuo won bronze in the 58 kg class with a total of 231 kg, the first Olympic medal of her career².

Then she began rewriting records.

At the 2017 Taipei Universiade, competing at home, she lifted 142 kg in the clean and jerk, breaking the world record, and totaled 249 kg¹⁰. That same year, at the World Weightlifting Championships in Anaheim, United States, she won two golds and one silver². In 2018, at the World Championships in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, she was even more astonishing: after the International Weightlifting Federation had just adjusted the classes and created the 59 kg category, she broke three world records at once: snatch (105 kg), clean and jerk (132 kg), and total (237 kg)¹¹. At the 2019 World Championships in Pattaya, Thailand, she pushed the clean and jerk to 140 kg and the total to 246 kg, breaking two more world records². In April 2021, at the Asian Weightlifting Championships in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, she set records again with a 110 kg snatch and a 247 kg total¹².

Across her career, she has broken world records 11 times. The three peak numbers in the 59 kg class: 110 kg in the snatch, 140 kg in the clean and jerk, and 247 kg total².

Tokyo’s 236 Kilograms

On July 27, 2021, at the Tokyo International Forum. It was an Olympics held under the COVID-19 pandemic, with no spectators in the venue³.

Kuo Hsing-chun entered the competition holding three world records. On her first snatch attempt, she lifted 103 kg successfully, immediately setting a new Olympic record³. For the next two attempts, she chose a conservative approach, saving her strength for the clean and jerk. Her first clean and jerk, 123 kg, went up steadily. Her second, 133 kg, succeeded; in that instant the gold medal was already secured, and the Olympic records for clean and jerk and total were broken at the same time³.

Three attempts, three Olympic records. A total of 236 kg.

For her third clean and jerk, she challenged 141 kg, the same weight as the barbell that injured her in 2014. She did not lift it. She fell seated onto the platform, rolled once, got up with a bright smile, and saluted the stands. Foreign media captured the moment and described her as an athlete who “genuinely loves and enjoys competition”¹³. In a post-competition interview, she explained that her hand slipped a little on the third attempt and she fell, then thought, “I had to make a glamorous turn out of it”¹³.

This was Taiwan’s first gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics, and the first Olympic gold medal in the history of Taiwanese weightlifting³.

Paris: A Third Medal While Injured

At the 2024 Paris Olympics, Kuo Hsing-chun was 30 and struggling with a lower-back injury. She lifted 105 kg in the snatch, 130 kg in the clean and jerk, and totaled 235 kg, winning bronze⁴. The gold went to China’s Luo Shifang (241 kg), and the silver to Canada’s Maude Charron (236 kg).

On her final clean and jerk attempt, she challenged 137 kg and failed. Her back injury prevented her from generating force⁴.

“I stopped caring about the injury. I just decided to let it hurt.”¹⁴

The result was far below her peak, but the meaning of this bronze medal lay beyond the numbers. Kuo became the first Taiwanese athlete to win medals at three consecutive Olympic Games: eighth in London, bronze in Rio, gold in Tokyo, and bronze in Paris, an Olympic career spanning 12 years⁴.

A Crossroads at 32

In May 2025, at the Asian Weightlifting Championships in Kuala Lumpur, Kuo lifted 95 kg in the snatch, 125 kg in the clean and jerk, and totaled 220 kg in the women’s 59 kg class, winning bronze. Her result was a full 16 kg below her Tokyo peak¹⁵. At the World Championships that same year, she returned to the 58 kg class under the new category system and won bronze medals in both snatch and clean and jerk¹⁶. When the roster for the 2026 Asian Championships was announced, she was not listed to compete¹⁷.

Questions about retirement began to be put directly in front of her.

“As an athlete, deciding when to stop your career is truly a very difficult thing.”¹⁸

She did not give an answer, only a timetable: the NT$10 million prize money received in partnership with the Hondao Senior Citizen’s Welfare Foundation had continued to flow toward rural areas, and her next goal was the 2026 Nagoya Asian Games¹⁸.

Kuo Hsing-chun Off the Platform

Kuo Hsing-chun has donated more money than most Taiwanese athletes earn in a lifetime.

The Penghu ambulance in 2016 cost NT$1.5 million⁶. In 2017, she donated all NT$1.9 million of her Universiade prize money back to communities, including NT$400,000 to Taitung Baosang Junior High School¹⁹. In 2019, she produced a charity calendar and donated the proceeds to the Genesis Social Welfare Foundation’s Taitung branch for the care of people in vegetative states¹⁹. In December 2024, working with the Hondao Senior Citizen’s Welfare Foundation, she donated another NT$100,000 to Taitung Fengrong Elementary School and Baosang Junior High School¹⁹.

“I came from a rural area, so I know what children in rural areas need.” She has repeated this sentence often, and it is not a slogan. Every donation has returned to the place where she grew up.

Her great-grandmother carried culture forward through song; Kuo does it through barbells and a checkbook. The same Malan bloodline passed down both talent and the impulse that once you have something, you give it back.

Further Reading:

• Tai Tzu-ying — Also a core member of Taiwan’s Tokyo Olympic delegation, badminton world queen
• Yang Yung-wei — Tokyo Olympic judo silver medalist, winner of Taiwan’s first Olympic medal in judo
• Lee Yang and Wang Chi-lin — Tokyo Olympic badminton men’s doubles gold medalists, the story of Wang Chi-lin and Lee Yang
• Lee Yang — A two-time Olympic gold medalist whose biography traces his turn toward becoming the first minister of Taiwan’s Ministry of Sports
• Lee Chih-kai — Tokyo Olympic pommel horse silver medalist, the 20-year journey of the “Tumbling Boy”

References