(LEAD) (Olympics) S. Korea secures at least silver in mixed rifle team event for 1st medal in Paris

South Korea secured its first medal of the Paris Olympics in shooting Saturday, the first day of the medal race following the opening ceremony the previous evening. Park Ha-jun and Keum Ji-hyeon qualified for the gold medal match in the 10-meter air rifle mixed team event at the Chateauroux Shooting Centre in Chateauroux, about 270 kilometers south of Paris. Park and Keum scored a combined 631.4 points to finish second in the qualification stage, while the Chinese team of Sheng Lihao and Huang Yuting topped the qualification round with 632.2 points. Park and Keum will grab at least a silver medal, even if they lose to Sheng and Huang. The battle for the gold between the top two qualifying teams will be held later Saturday, immediately following the bronze medal match, between the No. 3- and No. 4-ranked qualifiers, starting at 10:30 a.m. (local time), or 5:30 p.m. (South Korea time). It will be the first medal event of the Paris Olympics. South Korea has won a gold medal on the first day of every Summe r Olympics since 2008. In the gold medal match, shooters will each fire single shots on command within a 50-second limit. The two shooters' combined score will be their team's score. The team with the higher score after each shot will earn two points, and a tie results in one point. The first team to reach 16 points will be the winner. Park and Keum were put together as a team Thursday, after they had each been training with a different partner in the weeks leading up to the Olympics -- Park with Ban Hyo-jin and Keum with Choe Dae-han. With Keum outperforming Ban, a 16-year-old making her Olympic debut, in training just ahead of the Olympics, the Korea Shooting Federation decided to shuffle the deck at the last minute, and the decision paid off with a medal. Choe and Ban finished 22nd out of 28 teams in the qualification round with 623.7 points. Source: Yonhap News Agency