KUALA LUMPUR, June 27. ALLEN Ong lowered his own national record in the 50m freestyle and Alex Lim won his fifth event in meet record time on the final day of the Malaysian Open swimming championships at the Kuala Lumpur Swimming Complex in Cheras today.
Allen clinched his second appearance in the Athens Olympics when he touched in 23.49 seconds, breaking his previous national mark of 23.53 set four years ago. The Olympic B qualifying standard is 23.64.
“I am very happy to have reached my goal of swimming in an additional event in the Olympics,” said Allen, who had already qualified in the 100 meters off his winning swim last December at the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games in Vietnam. “My mind was all set for it. I was confident of breaking the national record,” added Allen
Alex Lim, known in his homeland as Lim Keng Liat, was also in record-breaking mode. Lim, a junior-to-be at the University of California, won his fifth gold medal when he smashed the meet record of 2:10.64 in the 200 meter backstroke with a strong 2:06.03.
Another Lim — Malaysia's Lubrey Lim — took the 100m fly in 57.59 seconds, well off the Olympic qualifying standard of 56.16.
Fopurteen year-old Chui Lai Kwan won Malaysia's fourth gold of the day, as she clocked 27.01 seconds to take the 50m free, three-tenths of a second ahead of India’s Shikha Tandon.