Welson eyes three gold medals in SEA Games
KUALA LUMPUR: Swimmer Welson Sim has set his sights on winning three gold medals at the upcoming 29th Kuala Lumpur SEA Games which will be held at the National Aquatic Centre here, from Aug 21-26.
The 20-year-old wants to produce his best performance at the biennial games to defend his 400m freestyle gold and also add the 200m and 1,500m freestyle gold medals.
With Singapore’s 2016 Rio Olympics gold medallist Joseph Schooling expected to steal the limelight at the swimming pool, Welson Sim would be Malaysia’s main hope in swimming after defeating Olympic champion Mack Horton of Australia at the Mare Nostrum Tour in Monaco to win the men’s 400m freestyle gold with a new national record of three minutes 49.48 seconds.
“Everyone will be eyeing gold medals, so I do not want to make promises. However, I will keep my focus on defending my 400m freestyle gold, besides going for the 200m and 1,500m freestyle event gold medals,” he said during the ‘Kita Juara’ programme press conference at the Renaissance Hotel here, yesterday.
As Schooling is expected to only compete in the 50m and 100m butterfly and 100m freestyle events in the individual category, both swimmers might only rub shoulders in the 4x100m and 4x200m freestyle events.
Meanwhile, Phee Jinq En expressed confidence in retaining her women’s 100m breaststroke title, besides eyeing extra medals in the 50m and 200m breaststroke after making her Olympic debut in Rio last year.
The 19-year- old swimmer from Subang Jaya, who gained a year of experience at the American college level competitions after joining the Purdue University in the United States (US) last year, is well prepared for the mission.
“The past few weeks have been really great with great preparations… It has been a great year of training in the US with different environment, different people where I get to work with a whole bunch of new people and I think it is really great to develop my swimming career and studies,” she said.
However, she will be greatly challenged by Singapore’s Roanne Ho in the 50m breaststroke, Indonesian Vanessa Evato and Singapore’s Samantha Yeo in the 100m breaststroke while the 200m will be an open race. — Bernama