Walker Nguyen Thi Thanh Phuc won a gold medal at the Singapore Open Track and Field Championships at the National Stadium yesterday.

Thanh Phuc (middle).

Phuc finished first in the women’s 20km race walk with a time of 1hr 42.36min.

Inayati Inayati of Indonesia and Than Than Soe from Myanmar were second and third, respectively.

This result is better than her previous achievement of 1:45.19 which she set at the 28th Southeast Asian Games in Singapore last year. However, she couldn’t earn a ticket to compete in the Olympics Games in Brazil as she needed to walk within 1:36.00 to grab her slot and the event’s organisers announced in the last minute that the walking event wasn’t recognised as a qualifying round for upcoming Olympics.

As planned, Phuc will compete in several tournaments in June to seek a berth to Brazil.

“My result was not very good today because of an illness that forced me into hospital two weeks ago. I just walked following my coach’s advice at the Singapore event (considering this as a warm-up tournament),” said Phuc, who was making her debut in Singapore.

“My peak performance will be in June at a tournament in Europe,” she said, adding that she would try her best to gain entrance to the Olympics.

Hours later, Bui Thi Thu Thao of Vietnam took the gold medal in the women’s long jump.

The Southeast Asian Games winner topped the event with a result of 6.59m.

Thảo was happy with her title, and even happier that for the first time she had overcome her main rival Maria Natalia Londa of Indonesia, who beat Thao at the Asian Games for gold two years ago in South Korea.

Torres Sunan Marestella of the Philippines came second and Londa was third.

Thao said she was glad, but regrets not reaching her target of 6.70m to qualify for the Rio Olympics.

Two other Vietnamese atheltes also competed yesterday but failed to make the top three.

Nguyen Thi Oanh finished fifth in the women’s 100m event.

Oanh easily passed the qualification and semi-finals, but her result of 12.03sec in the final was not enough to bring her a medal.

Oanh will continue with the women’s 200m event this morning.

Her male teammate Le Trong Hinh, the SEA Games champion, didn’t make the final round in the 100m category.

He will take part in the second event of 200m this morning.

VNS