Weight loss helps Cindy make golden splash at the world stage

Woman of substance: Cindy Ong posing with the medals she won at the FINA World Masters Championships in Gwangju, South Korea.

KUALA LUMPUR: Former national butterfly swimmer Cindy Ong knew she had to do something when she weighed in at 72kg three years ago.

Little did she know it would lead her to become Malaysia’s first ever multi gold-medallist at the world stage for swimming.

She won five golds and two silvers in the 35-39 age category at the FINA World Masters Championships in Gwangju, South Korea, in August.

Cindy bagged the gold medals in the 100m freestyle, 50m and 100m butterfly, mixed 4x50 freestyle and medley relays. The two silvers were in the 50m breaststroke and freestyle events.

The 35-year-old, who now weighs 59kg, entered the Malaysia Book of Records for the “Most Gold Medals by an Individual Swimmer In a World Masters Championship” yesterday.

“When I was at my heaviest, I realised I needed to do something about it. I did what I knew best and that was swimming, ” said Cindy, who is now a mother of three.

“It started off with trying to lose weight but one thing led to another and I started competing at Masters meets and from there I got into the World Masters.

“In 2017, I finished fifth at the World Masters in the 100m freestyle in Budapest, which got me thinking, and that was six months after my caesarean section.

“It got me thinking that if I put in all my effort, I could go all the way but to actually do it is definitely the biggest achievement of my career to date.”

In Gwangju, Cindy clocked a time of 28.68 in the individual race but she set an even faster time of 27.72 in the medley relay.

It was not far off national record holder Marellyn Liew’s time of 27.45 set back in 2008.

Her time in the medley relay was also as good as the fourth place finisher in the 50m butterfly event at the 2017 Kuala Lumpur SEA Games.

She now has two more competitions – the Japan Masters Sprint later this month and the Malaysian Masters next month.

After that Cindy wants to take things easy and spend more time with her family.

“I’m going to take it a bit easier after these two events and spend more time with my kids.

“Prior to this, swimming involved my whole family as they had to bear with me waking up early to train, go to the gym and for recovery sessions.

“A lot of time has been taken out of my family for this, so now I’m just going to enjoy my time with my family.

“But even though I will take it easy, I won’t stop training totally as I have an eye on the Asian Masters Championships next year.”