The Star : New swimming star helps Selangor to golden haul and overall title

By LIM TEIK HUAT

SHAH ALAM: Selangor celebrated not just regaining the overall title for swimming but discovered a new budding star in Rosalind Pang as the MSSM (national schools) swimming championships concluded at Shah Alam Aquatic Centre yesterday.

Wonder girl : Rosalind Pang anchoring Selangor to the 4x50m relay title at the Shah Alam Aquatic Centre yesterday. She emerged as the undisputed queen of the pool in the MSSM Swimming Championships winning nine gold medals. - CHAN TAK KONG/The Star

Rosalind pulled off the superb feat of winning all nine of the events she entered for in the girls’ 12 and Under age group as she anchored the Selangor quartet to a record-breaking victory in 4x50m freestyle relay.

And the perfect feat saw her named the best overall swimmer in girl’s 12 and Under age group.

Rosalind, together with Liew Chern Xin, Ho Jia Ern and Shannen Kay, clocked 2:02.61 to break the five-year-old mark of 2:03.35 held by Sabah in the 4x50m freestyle relay.

Rosalind’s other victories were in 50m and 100m backstroke, 50m, 100m and 200m freestyle, 100m butterfly and 200m individual medley as well as the 4x50m medley relay.

It was an astonishing turn-around from last year’s meet held in Kota Kinabalu where she only managed a single medal in the same age-group – a silver in 100m freestyle.

But then the Selangor coaches were already expecting her to shine, having dominated her age-group category in the Selangor state swimming meet for the past two years.

“I did not expect to win all the events I took part in. My favourite disciplines are backstroke and freestyle, so I was actually targeting for these,” said Rosalind, who lives in Kota Kemuning and is already part of the Selangor state swimming team. “The results here will boost my efforts to swim faster. I am hoping I will be able to move up and swim for the country one day,” she added.

Selangor captured the overall title with a comfortable total tally of 37-36-14.

In second-placed were Sarawak with 20-18-24 with Sabah edging Kuala Lumpur to third place with 14-12-13. The city boys finished fourth with 13-11-9.

Sarawakian Welson Sim claimed two more gold medals in record-breaking fashion to bring his tally to seven gold medals altogether.

Welson erased the meet record of 4:07.33 held by Kevin Yeap since 2006 in winning the 400m freestyle Open race in 4:06.04.

The 16-year-old Welson anchored the Sarawak team to victory and a new record of 3:41.49 in the boy’s 16-18 4x100m freestyle, bettering the previous record of 3:41.89 set by Kuala Lumpur in 2011.