PARIS. – Don’t expect para swimmer Angel Mae Otom to blink when she performs side by side with Chinese star and defending champion Lu Dong in the women’s 50-meter butterfly S5 heats of the 17th Paris Paralympic Games at the La Defense arena pool here Friday.
Expect the irrepressible Pinay athlete to meet the challenge when she swims side-by-side with Lu, who will gun for her second individual gold and third overall after anchoring China to victory in the mixed 4×50-meter freestyle relay the previous day.
Ranked No. 2 in the world with a time 46.39 seconds entering the quadrennial sportsfest, Otom, the armless wonder from Olongapo City, will go into the event armed with a sixth-place finish in the women’s 50-meter backstroke S5 race two days ago.
Swimming in lane 3 beside Lu on lane 4, Otom will be tested if she has what it takes to keep up with the Chinese star known as the “Armless Mermaid,” with the top eight qualifiers from two heats advancing to the finals set at 5:59 p.m. (11:59 p.m. Manila time).
“Sayang, sayang,” Otom said after matching the powerhouse Chinese trio of Lu, He Shenggao and Liu Yu stroke for stroke and seemed poised to achieve a podium finish and break the country’s eight-year-old dry spell in the Paralympics before running out of steam in the last 15 meters.
Deputy para swimming coach Brian Ong said boosting Otom’s mental toughness in her last event at Europe’s largest indoor arena was one aspect they would work on.
“We are looking forward to her outing in the women’s 50-meter butterfly on Friday,” said the coach, confident that Otom would go all out in the country’s last-ditch bid to win a medal in the meet featuring the crí¨me dela crí¨me of physically-challenged bets from 168 nations.
The late table tennis player Josephine Medina was the last to achieve a podium finish for the Philippines, winning a bronze medal in the 2016 edition in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
