Tao Li in her sights

She broke one of Tao Li's South-east Asia (SEA) Games records yesterday, and Vietnam's Nguyen Thi Anh Vien is confident she can go head-to-head with one of Asia's fastest butterfly swimmers here next year.

Vien continued her gold rush at the OCBC Aquatic Centre on Day 4 of the swimming programme at the TYR 2nd South-east Asian Championships presented by Yakult yesterday.

The 17-year-old clocked 2min 12.46sec to win the women's 200m butterfly, bettering Singapore star Tao Li's SEA Games record of 2:13.49.

Sarisa Suwannachet of Thailand (2:14.70) won the silver and Singapore's Tan Jing-E claimed the bronze (2:17.57).

Vien also went below Tao Li's personal best of 2:12.63 and seems set for a huge splash at the 2015 SEA Games, which will be held here in June.

Speaking to The New Paper, the teenager said: "My goal was to get another gold medal tonight, and when I finished the butterfly event and I looked at my time, I immediately realised I had beaten her (Tao Li's) record.

"I feel really good about that, and I hope to continue winning many gold medals, and maybe getting more records.

"My aim is to do my best at next year's Games and I hope I can match her (Tao Li), even beat her."

Vien has collected six gold medals -including two yesterday, after she finished first in the 100m backstroke - so far at the Aquatic Centre, which will host the SEA Games swimming programme next year.

She won three gold medals (200 and 400 individual medleys and 200 backstroke) two silver and one bronze medal at last year's SEA Games in Myanmar.

Ironically, Vien considers the backstroke and the individual medley races as her pet events.

She said: "I'm more of a long distance swimmer. I prefer the individual medleys and the backstrokes because that's what I am good at, but I'm trained in all the strokes, so I can still compete in them."

CHEERS

In other events last night, Amanda Lim raised Singapore cheers after she clinched gold in the women's 200m freestyle in 2:03.98.

She beat Thailand's Benjaporn Sriphanomthorn (2:04.96) and Jessica Hodgson (2:05.84), who finished second and third, respectively.

Singapore's Clement Lim, Darren Lim, Benedict Boon and Danny Yeo won the men's 4x100m freestyle relay in 3:24.46, beating their Indonesian counterparts of Triadi Fauzi Sidiq, Glenn Victor, Alexis Wijaya Ohmar and Ricky Anggawijaya (3:26.02) in the two-team race.

The SEA Swimming Championships continues tomorrow until Tuesday. For full results and daily schedule, visit www.swimming.org.sg/TYR_2nd_SEA_Swimming_Championships_2014.htm

This article was first published on June 21, 2014.
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