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PALEMBANG: She felt like "dying".
But, with less than nine months to next year's Olympic Games in London, Singapore swim star Tao Li continues to set her sights on the big one.
On Monday night, the 21-year-old snared her fourth gold medal of the 26th SEA Games by clinching the 200m butterfly crown in 2 minutes 14.27 seconds, edging out Indonesia's Raina Saumi (2:15.43) in a tense finish in front of nearly 1,500 fans at the Jakabaring Aquatics Centre, with Thailand's Kitiya Patarawadee taking bronze (2:15.70).
It was the penultimate event on Day Three of the swimming programme, and it ended with Singapore's swimmers winning four more gold medals.
Arren Quek became the fastest man of the Games in swimming when he won the 50m freestyle, Shana Lim (women's 50m backstroke, 29.37 seconds) and the men's 4x100m freestyle relay quartet of Clement Lim, Russell Ong, Quek and Danny Yeo (3 minutes 23.35 seconds) all also got in on the gold-medal rush.
In the relay, first-leg swimmer Lim also set a new national 100m freestyle record with a time of 50.68 seconds.
The swimming team remain on course to match their 2009 haul of 14 gold medals.
Singapore also collected one silver from Zach Ong (men's 200m backstroke) and three bronze medals from Rainer Ng (men's 200m backstroke), Russell Ong (men's 50m freestyle) and Koh Hui Yu (women's 400m free).
Arren, 17, bagged a gold on his debut at the Games, and Shana, 18, collected her first individual win after three appearances (2007, 2009, 2011), but Tao Li's win was also special. Stamina has always been a bugbear for her.
She is aiming for a medal in the 100m fly at the London Games, and she was all smiles after the physical intensity in the longer distance on Monday night left her struggling to walk as she gingerly acknowledged the Indonesian fans after her swim.
"I really struggled out there. My first 50 metres went too fast. I never thought I could do a 29-second instead of my usual 31-sec," the 2008 Olympics 100m fly finalist said.
"I heard the crowd cheering really loudly for the Indonesian, so I couldn't let her catch up and just did what I could (in the last 50m) and hung in there."
Tao Li was initially slated to swim in nine events here, but she cut it down to eight. She has already won four, and collected a bronze in the 200m backstroke.
She has three events left, and said: "It's really good as I've never managed this, and I've only trained with (coach) Ian (Turner) for six weeks and haven't tapered for this meet ... At most I would have five events, but here I've eight, most of which are around 200m which is not my pet (events), so I really feel like dying (from exhaustion)."
Arren and Shana also swam their hearts out on Monday night.
Arren was over the moon, when he said: "It was disbelief at first, but then the emotions kicked in. It took me a while after I touched the wall to register that was first ... It's worth the sacrifices and it hasn't gone to waste."
Shana, a second-year criminal justice sophomore at the University of Arkansas, will have something to tell her fans in school.
"My friends and team-mates, even my coach in the States have been telling me this is my third SEA Games and I need to have one to call my own. This is definitely one of the races that I'm definitely going to remember," she said. - TODAY
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