SEREMBAN: Marellyn Liew aspires to become a beautician but that can wait as her swimming career is going strong at the moment.
Marellyn earned early qualification for the Laos SEA Games after winning the 100m butterfly final in the Malaysian Open championships at Paroi Aquatic Centre here yesterday.
The 19-year-old from Sabah clocked 1:01.94 to dip inside the SEA Games silver medal mark of 1:02.08.
Sarawak’s Hii Siew Siew took silver in 1:04.53 while Rachel Leung of Hong Kong finished with 1:04.70 for the bronze medal.
Laos here she comes: Marellyn Liew splashing her way to the 100m butterfly gold in the Malaysian Open at the Paroi Aquatic Centre Saturday and (below) showing off her gold medal. — DARRAN TAN / The Star It was the second gold in the meet for Marellyn after her 50m butterfly triumph on Friday.
Qualifying early on merit for the SEA Games will put Marellyn in the right frame of mind to prepare for an all-out assault come December.
Marellyn took bronze behind Malaysian team-mate Los Luisa Santos in her SEA Games debut in Korat but has since stamped her mark and currently holds the national record over the 50m and 100m distances.
Marellyn switched her training base from Sabah to Kuala Lumpur after enrolling for a beautician course at a private college recently.
However, her training is not affected as her course is only in the evenings and Marellyn believes she is on the right track to peak at the SEA Games.
“I will be swimming in the coming World Championships in Rome but the SEA Games will be my main focus this year where I hope to do a personal best. It will be tough to fight for gold as Singapore’s Tao Li is very strong and has competed in the Olympic final,” said Marellyn, who was named the Best Sportsgirl in the Malaysia Games (Sukma) in Terengganu last year.
Daniel Bego of Sarawak also lived up to his billing as the top male butterfly swimmer by winning the men’s event in a new Malaysian Open record of 54.71.
Daniel smashed his own meet record of 55.06 set two years ago to leave Foo Jian Beng of Selangor trailing in second place in 56.66.
The 19-year-old later took his gold medal tally to eight by winning the 50m freestyle final in 23.62.
Jian Beng, the national record holder at 23.45, settled for silver in 24.00.
Daniel came out tops in the 50m, 100m and 200m butterfly as well as the 100m and 200m freestyle. He also anchored Sarawak to victory in the 4x200m freestyle.
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