Schooling on cloud nine
The new superstar takes the 4x100-metres medley relay gold
singapore — Joseph Schooling finished the Southeast Asian Games with nine gold medals from his nine events, justifying his premeet status as the star of the show in Singapore. The Texas-based Schooling was appearing in a significant international swim meet in his home country for the first time, and he didn’t disappoint his millions of fans in the host nation.
When he entered the water for his butterfly leg of the 4x100-meters medley relay on Thursday night — the last event of the swimming program — Singapore had a lead of 0.82 of a second. He increased that to 2.65 seconds when he hit the wall for his changeover with the freestyle swimmer, setting Singapore on course for another games record of 3 minutes, 38.25 seconds.
The women’s star of the pool was Nguyen Thi Anh Vien of Vietnam, who finished with eight gold medals, a silver and a bronze and closed with victory in the 200 breaststroke. Singapore veteran Tao Li won her fifth gold of the games with victory in the 100 butterfly, the last of the women’s events.
Thailand made up ground in track and field, winning five of the 12 finals on the third day of the competition, including both high hurdles. Tittidet Jamras won the men’s 110 in a meet record 13.69 seconds and Punsoongneun Wallapa taking the women’s title.
Vietnam won three of the track titles, including Duong Van Thai and Do Thi Thao’s victories in the men’s and women’s 1,500 titles. Triyaningsih won the women’s SEA Games 10,000 title for the fifth time, and also completed a distance double after her victory in the 5,000.
She finished in 33 minutes, 44.53 seconds, well clear of second-place Pham Thi Hue of Vietnam, who was running in bare feet — one of three shoeless runners in the race, including Vietnam teammate Hoang Thi Thanh and 35-year-old Pa Pa of Myanmar.
Triyaningshi won the 5,00010,000 double in 2007, ‘09 and ‘11 — when she also won the marathon on home soil — and settled for a gold-silver combination in 2013.
In cycling, Robin Manullang won the men’s time trial for Indonesia and Marella Saramat won the women’s time trial for the Philippines. Meanwhile, SEA Games organisers launched an investigation into feared food poisoning on Thursday after many athletes feel sick in the cycling competition.
Cyclists complained their performance had been affected as the competition in Singapore got under way with the men’s and women’s individual time trials.
“The Singapore Southeast Asian Games Organising Committee has received a report of an incident that has affected a few athletes early this morning,” a statement said.
“We are investigating the matter with the relevant authorities and reinforcing hygiene practices.” The Straits Times newspaper said the cyclists were staying at Resorts World Sentosa, a hotel, casino and funpark complex popular with tourists.
Malaysian rider Mohammad Fauzan Ahmad Lutfi blamed his dinner of chicken and curry egg for his performance after he finished 11th in the men’s time trial.
“Two other riders, including my room-mate, are down too. I think it was the chicken and the curry egg at dinner. I felt sick at around 1am last night,” he said.
The incident follows a food poisoning outbreak at the 2010 Youth Olympic Games in Singapore, which affected more than 20 people working for the organising committee. —