2nd Singapore Youth Olympic Festival 2013 - Overall
by Icarus Sailing Media 17 Mar 2013 20:02 GMT
16-17 March 2013
The second and final day of the Singapore Youth Olympic Festival was an eventful one, and this included a very undecided weather, which sometimes created problems to the young athletes that were taking part.
Right from the first races, a heavy rain forced the organizers to postpone competition for couple of hours and wait for the skies to clear. Even though the Festival is taking place in the heart of the city, inside the Marina Bay Sands reservoir, all necessary precautions of course needed to be taken. Once the clouds were gone, so was the wind. Sailors now had to wait for the wind to pick up before they could start racing again. Once the situation improved the committee made yet another effort to restart those races close to the final stage, so that the winners could be decided. It was later in the afternoon that the arrival of a light breeze allowed the sailors to complete their races, and the best of them to proceed to the semifinals, before the grand finale that would decide the winners in each of the five classes competing here.
In the 29er class, it was the duo of Jonathon Yeo and Jan Ten E that excelled, with the pairs of Joshua Quo and Jeremia Guo and that of Brian Lee and Joshua Matthew Lim in second and third place respectively. In the same class, and the women's category Kimberly Lim Min and Savannah Siew managed to fulfill their potential and win that coveted gold medal! Occupying second place, the pair of Zandra Chew and Fathin Kasyiqah, and in third, that of Jillian Lee and Samantha Neubronner, In the Laser class Ryan Lo dominated in the men's category, with Malone Pun and Joel Neo in second and third place respectively. In the women's competition for the Laser Radials, victory belonged to Allison Maher. She was followed by Katrina Yeo and Ariel Ho this year. In the Bytes CII it was Bernie Chin who finished first in the boys' category, with Raynard Lee and Jeriel Tan occupying the second and third places. In the girls, Yukie Yokohama, the second and most recent world champion Singapore has in the optimist class, found herself once again in the top spot. Lim Sue Ying was in second place, and Gillian Tan, in third. In the very last class competing, the RS:One, Wallace Gan finished first with Nicholas Wee and Klinsman Ang following, while in the girls category, Ruth Mow was followed by Cheyenne Chan, in second place. The three teams competing in the SB20 class were all from the SMU. But it was the one skippered by Collin Lim that finished first, here in their hometown, followed by skippers Low Wen and Clement Lim.
And this wrapped another very successful event, here in Singapore, where the organizers succeeded in promoting true sportsmanship values, to those young athletes especially. The next Festival is scheduled in 2015, the year after the Youth Olympics Games that will take place in China. So it is all very possible that we will come across some young Olympians in that year. Yet all this wouldn't be possible without the firm support of a few individuals like Mr Ng Miang, who has been a firm supporter and driver of sport development in Singapore over the past 30 years. His contributions to sailing and Singapore's overall sporting progress as former Chairman of Singapore Sports Council has provided the foundation for the vibrant sporting scene today. He was also instrumental in bringing the first ever Youth Olympic Games to Singapore in 2010. While he is now serving and promoting sport development worldwide, sailing remains also close to Ng Miang's heart; he is always happy to see young sailors continuing to enjoy the sport. And he has always made it a point to take time out from his busy schedule to meet and encourage young sailors at events such as this year's Singapore Youth Olympic Festival. And at the end of this year's Festival, all winners took their deserved place in the podium, their happy faces showed it was all very much worth the effort.
www.syof.sg/about-us/singapore-youth-olympic-festival