KUALA LUMPUR: National swimmer, Christina Loh, set a new Malaysian Open Swimming Championship record in the women’s 100m breaststroke at the National Aquatic Centre in Bukit Jalil, here tonight.
Christina, 16, clocked one minute 11.23 seconds, erasing the old mark of 1:13.00s set by Negeri Sembilan’s Siow Yi Ting in 2007.
“I just hope that I can maintain my personal best of 1:10.70s but I am okay with the results,” said Christina, who represented Kuala Lumpur at the competition.
Christina’s time, however, did not enable her to qualify for the World Championship and the 2012 London Olympic Games.
The qualifying time for the World Championship is 1:09.01s for category A and 1:10.72s for category B, while for the Olympic Games it is 1:08.49s for category A and 1:10.89s for category B.
Following close behind Christina were two Hong Kong’s swimmers, Yvette Kong and Fiona Ma, posting times of 1:11.48s and 1:12.84s, respectively.
Christina added that she would now focus for tomorrow’s 50m breaststroke event.
“I hope I can perform well in tomorrow’s event and qualify for the World Championships,” she said.
Besides Christina’s feat, five more competition records were re-written on the first day of the competition today.
Among them were Sze Hang Yu of Hong Kong in the women’s 100m freestyle, where she qualified herself for the World Championships and Olympics, under category B after setting a time of 56.13s.
The Hong Kong swimmers dominated the pool with four gold, four silver and four bronze medals. – Bernama