Singapore’s champion swimmer clinches his sixth gold medal

The 19-year-old easily won the 100 metres butterfly, his favourite event, then led off the Singaporean 4x100m freestyle relay to an easy win.

Joseph Schooling swims in the Men’s 100m Butterfly final at the SEA Games in Singapore on Tuesday. — AP

Singapore — Joseph Schooling, showing no signs of weariness despite his gruelling schedule, collected another two gold medals at the 28th Southeast Asian Games on Tuesday, taking his golden stockpile to six and with the possibility of three more to come.

The 19-year-old easily won the 100 metres butterfly, his favourite event, then led off the Singaporean 4x100m freestyle relay to an easy win.

The Texas-based Schooling has won gold in each of the six events he has contested at Singapore’s new Aquatic Centre over the last three days, and is an overwhelming favourite to win his three remaining races.

He has broken the SEA Games record in all of the races he has contested so far, as well as getting under the ‘A’ qualifying time for next year’s Rio Olympics in four different event.

Schooling’s 18-year-old teammate Quah Zheng Wen has already won eight medals in the pool, including five gold, and has the chance to bag another four.

Quah swam the anchor leg in Tuesday’s relay after he had earlier stormed to victory in the 400m individual medley.

Vietnam’s Nguyen Thi Anh Vien, the outstanding female swimmer at the Games, won another two golds, in the 200m freestyle and 200m butterfly.

The 17-year-old, based in Florida, also has a silver and a bronze and two more races left.

In track and field, the Philippines completed a first-ever double in the 100m with two sprinters with American connections.

Texas-based Eric Shauwn Cray blitzed the field to win the men’s race in 10.25 seconds before 17-year-old Californian-born Kayla Anise Richardson edged the women’s in 11.76 after a photo-finish.

Both Richardson and Cray have Filipino mothers, American accents and a burning desire to take more SEA Games gold medals back to the Philippines.

Cray, 26, tapped the banner on his vest before the race and quickly sought out a flag from the crowd upon victory and talked of his pride at representing the country of his birth.

Another Filipino-American, Caleb Stuart, celebrated gold in the men’s hammer while Indonesia’s pocket-sized distance runner Triyaningsih won the women’s 5,000m, her ninth career SEA Games gold medal.

Standing four feet 10 inches tall, the 28-year-old from Central Java cruised to victory, crossing the lines 12 seconds ahead of her nearest rival.

Pandelela Rinong, one of the highest-profile competitors at the Games, won the women’s 10-metre platform gold medal for the fourth time in a row.

A silver medallist at the 2012 London Olympics, the 22-year-old was a class above her rivals, going through her routine of dives with a minimum of fuss as she prepares for this year’s world championships in Russia.

“These SEA Games have given me the motivation to train harder for the world championships and to qualify for the Rio Olympics,” she said.

The 28th SEA Games were awarded to Singapore as part of the country’s year-long celebrations marking the 50th anniversary of independence from Malaysia.

The host-nation has invested heavily in its facilities and training and has dominated the first few days of competition, wining more than 50 gold medals for the first time and opening up a big lead on the table ahead of Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia.