Records fall as Thailand shines in track and field
Records fall as Thailand shines in track and field
CHIANG MAI, Thailand (JP): Three meet records tumbled
yesterday as host Thailand romped home with five gold medals in
the 18th Southeast Asian Games track and field competitions.
Thailand's winning run, along with a brilliant showing by
Malaysia, dealt a severe blow to defending champion Indonesia,
which ended the first day of track and field competitions without
a single gold.
The host team prevailed in the unconventional 4 X 200-meter
relay. Thailand landed two golds yesterday, with the men's
quartet winning its race in one minute and 23 seconds and their
female teammates finishing 1:36.03 for another gold.
"It's more than a satisfying feat, although we failed to meet
our target of six gold medals today," the Thai team manager
Anawin Pakdeejit said. "All of our athletes did so well, not to
mention the records they set."
Anawin, an Air Vice Marshall, said Thailand is now on track to
completing its medal winning target of 15 golds.
Sunisa Yoo Yao put Thailand ahead with her record breaking
throw of 16.56 meters in shot put. She improved her two-year-old
mark by 2.24 meters. Benjamas Ounkeaw added to Thailand's glory
with a second best throw of 14.38 for the silver.
Thailand took its gold-medal tally to three through Noodang
Phimpho in the women's 400m race. Noodang defended her title in
53.17 seconds, but remained 17-hundredths of a second away from
the mark she set in the 1993 SEA Games in Singapore.
Aktawat Sakulchan sealed Thailand's tremendous day on the
track in style with his 400m gold medal. The veteran runner
dashed to 46.05, shattering his own record of 46.37 he set in
Manila four years ago. It was sweet revenge for Aktawat, who
finished fourth two years ago.
"I ran with my old mood today. Besides, I had no complaints of
injuries. It helped me set the pace from the onset until the end
of the race," he said.
Indonesia lost its only chance to win a consolation yesterday
when Malaysian Mohammad Yazid Imran beat SEA Games javelin
defending champion Frederikus Mahuse. Imran threw 70.06 meters in
his first attempt to beat Mahuse's best effort of 63.7 for his
first SEA Games gold medal.
"It's not quite surprising since I made it 73.4 in Singapore
last September," Imran said.
Both Imran and Mahuse stepped onto the pitch with injuries,
but the Malaysian showed his resilience. "I was a little bit
lucky that my foot injury did not bother me so much," Imran said.
Mahuse failed to shrug off his chronic knee injury of three
years. He squandered three opportunities with a modest throw of
under 60 meters. The Indonesian could only be content that his
SEA Games mark of 72.43 remained untouched.
"I would have run out of time if I had focused on healing my
injury during the training session for the Games," Mahuse said.
Malaysia struck a double from veteran Nur Herman Majid, who
clocked the fastest time of 14.25 seconds in the 110m hurdle.
Vietnam's Nguyen Van Loi and Anekpol Mongkoldech of Thailand took
the silver and bronze respectively.
Murusamy Ramachandran completed the Malaysian hat trick in a
record breaking run in the 10,000m. He was timed 29:49.79 to
shave 5.3 seconds off his own mark, which he set two years ago.
The Philippines and Vietnam shared the glory with a gold each
from the women's long jump and women's 100m hurdles respectively.
Veteran Elma Muros gave the Philippines its lone gold when she
leapt 6.34 meters. But Muros was surprised by Vietnam's Bich
Huong Vu in the 100m hurdles. Vu clocked 13.69 to outsprint title
holder Muros by just one-tenth of a second. (amd)