Singapore's Shanti Pereira tops 200m heats, qualifies for final at Asian Games

HANGZHOU, China: Despite running on six hours of sleep, Singapore's Shanti Pereira showed little signs of fatigue as she topped the women's 200m heats on Sunday (Oct 1) to qualify for the finals.

The morning after sprinting her way to a 100m silver, Pereira was back at it again at the Hangzhou Olympic Sports Centre Stadium. Her time of 23.14s meant that she was the fastest qualifier from the three heats.

Pereira will compete in the final of the event on Monday at 7.45pm local time. This is her first 200m Games final.

"Considering the really little rest I had because of the medal ceremony plus I had to go for (an) anti-doping (test), I got back pretty late," she told reporters on Sunday.

"I was kind of prepared for that (short turnaround between events) just in case that was to happen."

Earlier in the morning, Singapore men's 110m hurdles national record holder Ang Chen Xiang also booked his place in the final after clocking a time of 13.90s in the heats. Ang finished seventh overall and will also compete on Monday.

On Saturday, Pereira ended Singapore’s near 50-year wait for a track and field medal in the Asian Games, after she clinched a silver in the women’s 100m.

"Mentally I knew I just had to reset no matter what the result was yesterday and focus on today. I'm glad the conditions were great ... The wind was good ... weather was really nice also, really cooling, not too hot. It was very nice," said the Singaporean.

The last Singaporean to win an athletics gold was Chee Swee Lee (women's 400m) in 1974. Prior to Pereira’s silver, Singapore’s last Asiad medal in the sport also came in 1974.

In May, Pereira became the first Singaporean woman to win both the 100m and 200m events at the same edition of the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games and then followed that up with a sprint double at the Asian Athletics Championships in July.

Last month in Budapest, Hungary, she became the first Singaporean to make a World Championships semi-finals after a stellar showing in the 200m. She also met the qualifying mark for the event at the 2024 Olympics in Paris.

"Yesterday was a major confidence boost, so was today," said Pereira.