Singapore sailors take 2 silvers, 2 bronzes at Asian Games in Hangzhou
Singapore sailors Keira Carlyle and Isaac Goh (Photo: SNOC)
HANGZHOU: More than a decade after his last Asian Games medal, two-time Games champion Justin Liu clinched a silver in the mixed Nacra 17 event at the Hangzhou Asian Games on Tuesday (Sep 26).
And this was a finish to savour, for it was one the sailor earned by pairing up with his wife Denise Lim.
"I'm very happy for her, she's put in a lot of work even though she's never been to an Asian Games," he told reporters.
"Asian Games brings about a different kind of pressure, with a small fleet, and the form book goes out the window. And every day she's been like: 'Let's keep fighting' ... It was inspiring me this whole time."
Zhao Huancheng and Wang Saibo from host nation China won gold while Thailand’s Teerapong Watiboonruang and Siriwimon Harintachat claimed bronze.
"It feels quite surreal. It hasn't really sunk in, still absorbing it," said Lim.
"We wanted to qualify for the Asian Games in 2014 and we didn't qualify for it, and the next Asian Games didn't have our event. So we've been fighting for many, many years to try to make it to the Asian Games," added Liu, who partnered Sherman Cheng to win the men’s 420 event in 2006, and repeated the feat at the 2010 Asiad.
"To finally be here, to finally get a medal, when we finished it was so much emotion because the journey has been so long and we finally did it."
There was also another silver and two bronzes for Singapore, courtesy of Isaac Goh (boys' ILCA4), Keira Carlyle (girls' ILCA4) and the duo of Kimberly Lim and Cecilia Low (women's 49erFX).
Goh, a gold medallist at the Southeast Asian Games earlier this year, finished second after eleven races. The event was won by Thailand’s Weka Bhanubandh while Malaysia’s Muhammad Asnawi Iqbal Adam took bronze.
The Singaporean said he was satisfied but had been hoping to strike gold.
"My performance at this regatta has been pretty good, I feel like I've been competing at a high level," Goh added.
"It's just been me and the other guy (Weka) at the top all the time, and we've been fighting each other. We had a good fight throughout."
In the girls' ILCA4 event, Carlyle took bronze. The event was won by Thailand’s Noppassorn Khunboonjan and India Neha Thakur took silver.
Going into the race knowing that she had to finish ahead of South Korea's Seol Jaekyoung to clinch a bronze, Carlyle kept her cool to do just that, winning her final and eleventh race.
"I was trying not to stress out. I was trying to distract myself right before we launched so I was talking to (the) seniors, trying to think of a plan of what I could do," she said. "I'm just happy that it worked out."
In the women's 49erFX, Kimberly Lim and Low - champions at the 2018 Games - finished behind China's Hu Xiaoyu and Shan Mengyuan and Japan's Misaki Tanaka and Sera Nagamatsu.
"This week was quite a challenging one. We had some good moments and not so good moments," said Lim.
"We learnt a lot and we tried our best. We couldn't have done anything different and that is something we have to hold on to and just work towards the next event," added Low.
At the last Asian Games in 2018, the Singapore sailing contingent won one gold and one bronze. Team Singapore finished with four golds, four silvers and 14 bronzes across all sports in that edition.
A number of Singapore's sailors including world champion kitefoiler Maximilian Maeder and Olympian Ryan Lo remain in medal contention going into the last day of competition on Wednesday.
Singapore's first medal at the 2023 Asian Games - deferred by a year due to the pandemic - came from wushu exponent Kimberly Ong's bronze on Monday in the women's changquan event.
