Duong Thuy Vi brings home the first gold medal for Wushu

Duong Thuy Vi is the top medal hope of Vietnamese Wushu. At the 31st SEA Games last year, the girl born in 1993 competed impressively, bringing home 2 gold medals.

Thuy Vi in the female sword performance

However, at this year's SEA Games, Thuy Vi and her teammates are expected to face difficulties when the host country cuts some of their strong events as well as reduces the number of medal sets. The host country also changes the way medals are awarded for each event. Instead of awarding one set of medals for one performance event like every previous Games, the host country combines two events to award one set of medals.

For Thuy Vi, if she wants to win a medal, she must compete well in the spearmanship and swordsmanship events, then add up the points for these two events to rank. On the competition day yesterday, May 10, Thuy Vi completed the spearmanship event with a score of 9.606. This morning, May 11, she continued to compete in the women's swordmanship event and achieved 9.623 points. Adding up the points in the spearmanship and swordmanship events, Thuy Vi achieved the highest score among the competing athletes, thereby winning the gold medal.

“Actually, after finishing the swordsmanship competition today, I felt very comfortable. During the competition, I just tried my best to complete the competition in the best way, and I haven’t thought about whether I will win the gold medal or not,” Thuy Vi shared after winning the gold medals in the spearmanship and swordsmanship categories.

Girl born in 1993 "opens" gold medal for Vietnamese Wushu

Talking about the special gold medal on her 30th birthday, Thuy Vi said: “This is a special gold medal marking my 30th birthday. Surely everyone remembers that 10 years ago at the 2013 SEA Games in Myanmar, I won the first gold medal for the Vietnamese Sports Delegation. Ten years later, I am still standing here and winning the gold medal. This is truly a very meaningful medal to me.”

At the 32nd SEA Games, Wushu has 23 competitions, including 14 Taolu (performance) events and 9 Sanshou (combat) events. Wushu has been considered Vietnam's strength at the SEA Games for many years. At the 31st SEA Games, Vietnamese Wushu won 10 gold medals. This year, due to many objective reasons, Vietnamese Wushu only set a target of winning at least 3 gold medals.

THAI AN; photo: QUY LUONG

Source