Taiwan, Saturday, May 28, 2011 — For the second time in four months, Dipna Lim Prasad broke her own national 100 metres hurdles record twice in the same day.

Competing at the Taiwan Open Athletic Championships, the 19-year-old Nanyang Technological University student broke her existing mark of 14.56 seconds with her 14.49sec run to finish fifth-fastest in the heats.

That qualified her for the final and although she finished in fifth position again, Dipna lowered the mark yet again to 14.23sec. The wind speeds for the runs were +0.8 and +0.7 metres per second respectively, well within the legal limit for record-setting purposes.

Dipna is now just 0.02sec away from meeting the South-East Asian (SEA) Games qualifying mark of 14.21sec. The Games will be held in Palembang, Indonesia, this November.

In January’s Singapore Athletic Association (SAA)’s Track and Field Series Meet, Dipna lowered her then-national record of 14.72sec with same-day runs of 14.69sec and 14.56sec. She also clocked a hand-timed run of 14.3sec in April’s SAA meet.

Muhd Zaki Bin Sapari continued his phenomenal performances in the 400m hurdles when he broke his own electronically-timed national junior record, which he set less than two weeks ago at the Malacca Open. He clocked 53.59sec in Friday’s heats to better his performance of 54.02sec recorded at Malacca.

The 19-year-old Republic Polytechnic student finished eighth in the final with a time of 53.82sec.

Zaki’s first ever 400m hurdles race won him the gold medal at last year’s Institute-Varsity-Polytechnic (IVP) Championships. He clocked 56.09sec then, and has since improved to 55.76sec (March’s National Junior Championships), 55.62sec (April’s SAA Series) and 55.30sec (May’s SAA Series), before breaking the junior record in Malacca.

Zaki’s 53.59sec performance also breaks the hand-timed national junior record of 53.6, set by Syed Abdul Malik Aljunied in July 1986. Zaki had met the SEA Games qualifying mark of 54.15sec with his 54.02sec performance.

He is now the third fastest 400m hurdler in Singapore’s history, behind national record holder Seah Soo Lye (52.3sec in 1983) and M. Gunasena (53.2sec, 1966).

17-year-old Ng Chin Hui ran a superb personal best of 48.76sec to finish fourth in the men’s 400 metres final. His previous best stood at 48.98sec set at April’s National Inter-School Track and Field Championships and the Raffles Institution student served notice of his intention to better that when he ran a 49.01sec in the heats.

In the 4×400 metres relay final a day earlier, Chin Hui had teamed up with Zaki, Muhd Firdaus Juhari and Kenneth Khoo to finish third in a time of 3 minutes 15.09 seconds. That was a season’s best time for any Singaporean team and the exceptionally-slow SEA Games qualifying mark of 3:26.46 has now been met on seven different occasions this year.

The bronze-medal performance at the previous Games are used as the benchmark for qualifying, and a lack of participation in the 4x400m relay in the 2009 Laos Games saw the home nation take the bronze in a time that was more than 16 seconds slower than what the second-placed Malaysian team managed.

The women’s team of Dipna, Wendy Enn, Valerie Pereira and T. Piriyah won the gold medal in a fast time of 3:50.09. They are now just less than a second away from the SEA Games qualifying mark of 3:49.28. Like the men’s quartet, the same four runners bettered their performance at the Malacca Open, where they clocked 3:55.36.

In other events, sprinters Muhd Amirudin Bin Jamal and Valerie Pereira clocked season’s bests in the 100m and 200m finals respectively. Amirudin finished sixth in 10.69sec, while Valerie was fifth in 25.32sec. National record holder Piriyah also ran her year’s fastest time of 64.97sec in the women’s 400m hurdles final to finish sixth.

Results (Singaporeans only)
Men
100m heats:
Calvin Kang 10.86 seconds (wind speed -0.7 metres per second, season’s best)
Muhd Elfi Bin Mustapa 10.87 (+0.4)
Muhd Amirudin Bin Jamal 10.92 (0.0)
Gary Yeo 10.92 (-0.7)
Izwan Firdaus Hanif 11.18 (+0.4)
Lee Cheng Wei 11.18 (-0.1)

100m semi-finals:
Muhd Amirudin Bin Jamal 10.79 (-0.5)
Calvin Kang 10.82 (+0.3, SB)
Gary Yeo 10.83 (+0.3)
Muhd Elfi Bin Mustapa 10.89 (+0.7)
Izwan Firdaus Hanif 10.98 (-0.5, SB)
Lee Cheng Wei 11.10 (+0.3)

100m final:
Muhd Amirudin Bin Jamal 10.69 (6th, +0.3, SB)

400m heats:
Ng Chin Hui 49.01 (3rd)
Kenneth Khoo 49.03 (5th)
Muhd Firdaus Juhari 50.53 (11th)

400m final:
Ng Chin Hui 48.76 (4th, personal best)
Kenneth Khoo 48.85 (5th)

400m hurdles:
Heats: Muhd Zaki Bin Sapari 53.59 (6th, National Junior Record)
Final: Muhd Zaki Bin Sapari 53.82 (8th)

4x400m Relay final:
Team Singapore (Muhd Firdaus Bin Juhari, Ng Chin Hui, Muhd Zaki Bin Sapari, Kenneth Khoo) 3:15.09 (3rd, SB)

Women
200m:
Heats: Valerie Seema Pereira 25.41 (4th, +1.0, SB)
Final: Valerie Seema Pereira 25.32 (5th, +0.6, SB)

100m hurdles:
Heats: Dipna Lim Prasad 14.49 (5th, +0.8, National Record)
Final: Dipna Lim Prasad 14.23 (5th, +0.7, National Record)

400m hurdles:
Heats: T. Piriyah 66.44 (5th)
Final: T. Piriyah 64.97 (6th, SB)

4x400m Final:
Team Singapore (Wendy Enn, Valerie Seema Pereira, T. Piriyah, Dipna Lim Prasad) 3:50.09 (1st, SB)