Perak swimmer Cindy stamps her mark

THERE was just no stopping Perak swimmer Cindy Ong as she affirmed her status as the undisputed swimming queen for the 10th edition of the Games by claiming her fourth national record at the Aquatic Centre in Paroi yesterday.  

This time, Cindy smashed her own mark of 1:03.31 in the 100m butterfly, which she set in the 2001 Kuala Lumpur SEA Games. 

Cindy set a blistering pace from the start to finish in 1:02.98, more than one body-length ahead of her nearest challenger, Marellyn Liew of Sabah, to complete a sweep of all the butterfly events.  

Marellyn clocked 1:06.10 to finish ahead of Selangor's Kok Hui Jean (1:06.54). 

It was Cindy's fifth gold medal of these Games – having triumphed in the 100m freestyle, 50m and 200m butterfly, and 50m breaststroke. 

Cindy is now set to claim the Best Female Athlete award for her record-breaking efforts over the last three days.  

Besides bringing down the oldest national mark, which former Malaysian swimming queen Nurul Hudda Abdullah set in the 1000m freestyle in 1987, Cindy also set new national records in the 50m races in breaststroke and butterfly.  

The US -based Cindy had only one national mark to her name when she arrived in Seremban last week and she is now determined to make five in the 50m freestyle today. 

Marilyn Chua holds the record of 27.16, which she set in a competition in Los Angeles four years ago to qualify for the Sydney Olympics. 

“If I can clock my personal best (27.00), I am confident of bringing down the national record,” said Cindy, who attributed her vast improvement to tough training under her university coach, Bryan Reynold.  

Part of the regime includes doing 120 push-ups thrice a week and Cindy, dropped from the Gemilang 2006 programme last year for indiscipline, more than proved her point.  

“I wanted to show that I could still compete with the best of the field in Malaysia. I trained very hard for this Sukma and I knew that if I just pushed to reach my personal best, I would finish on top,” said Cindy, who will turn 20 on June 7.  

Cindy is also set to receive a windfall from the Perak government. A gold medal is worth RM2,000 and she is now assured of RM10,000.  

Three Sukma records also came down on the fourth day of competition. 

Kuala Lumpur's Ong Ming Xiu rewrote the meet record in the 400m freestyle belonging to fellow City dweller Sia Wai Yen by 0.01 seconds - clocking a 4:25.82 for her third gold medal in these Games.  

Daniel Bego bagged a fifth individual gold medal when he won the boys' 400m freestyle in 4:07.77.  

Negri Sembilan's Siow Yi Ting also lived up to her promise when she smashed her own Sukma record in the 200m breaststroke event.  

Yi Ting, a triple gold medallist in the Vietnam SEA Games last year, clocked 2:33.21 to better her time of 2:37.85 set in Kota Kinabalu two years ago.  

The final Games record went to the Sarawak girls' quartet of Kho Ai Hwee, Joy Bendindang, Amira Nuria Anuar and Kimbeley Yap. They clocked 8:46.63 to win the 4x200m freestyle gold medal, shaving more than three seconds off their previous record of 8:49.69.