Shoulder injury forces Pandelela, Yiat Qing to exit synchro event at world meet
SINGAPORE (July 28): A left shoulder injury sustained by national diving queen Datuk Pandelela Rinong forced her and Lee Yiat Qing to withdraw from the women's 10-metre synchronised event at the World Aquatics Championships in Singapore today.
They completed two of the five dives with a total of 87 points before an announcement was made regarding their withdrawal during the preliminaries at the OCBC Aquatic Centre.
Pandelela said the injury, sustained earlier this month but still manageable under physiotherapy, was triggered during the warm-up session.
'Therefore, after two dives, we decided to withdraw for safety reasons. I would like to thank you, especially those who came to the venue to support us,' she posted on Facebook.
In the morning session, Nurqayyum Nazmi Mohamad Nazim and Yong Rui Jie failed to advance to the finals in the men's 3m synchronised springboard event after finishing outside the top eight.
The duo finished in 21st place with 302.76 points in the 26-team preliminaries.
Meanwhile, national swimmer Khiew Hoe Yean failed to advance to the semi-finals of the men's 200m freestyle event after clocking 1 minute 48.10 seconds at the World Aquatics Championships Arena.
He finished fourth in Heat Three and 31st overall out of 59 swimmers.
SEA Games gold medallist Phee Jinq En did not start in the women's 100m breaststroke event due to a hip and groin issue.
Malaysia's national swimming head coach Eric Anderson said Jing En opted out of the event, in hopes of better preparing for the 50m breaststroke scheduled for Aug 2.
'The team flew here straight from the World University Games in Berlin, which is hardly ideal preparation. It was our main target event where we aimed to peak there,' he told Bernama when contacted. – Bernama Lee Yiat Qing pandelela rinong sports World Aquatics Championships
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