Canoeing athlete Nguyen Thi Huong and Rowing athlete Pham Thi Hue won two official tickets for Vietnamese sports to attend the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Nguyen Thi Huong participated in the Asian Olympic Canoeing qualifying round, held in Japan this morning, April 21. She competed in the final of the women's 200m C1 sprint event with eight rowers from Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Thailand, Indonesia, Iran, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan.
The athlete born in 2001 competed fiercely and had a good sprint to finish second with a time of 49.351 seconds, thereby winning a silver medal and one of two spots to the 2024 Olympics. Nguyen Thi Huong was only 72% faster than Kazakhstan athlete Mariya Brovkova. The remaining ticket and gold medal belonged to Uzbekistan athlete Nilufar Zokirova with 49.109 seconds.
Nguyen Thi Huong (left) won a silver medal and an Olympic ticket in the C1 200m canoeing sprint event. Photo: Canoeing & Rowing Vietnam
Nguyen Thi Huong made history for canoeing when she won the first official ticket to the Olympics. The first canoeist was Doan Thi Cach who attended the 2004 Athens Olympics but with a special ticket.
Nguyen Thi Huong was born in 2001 in Vinh Phuc. Since childhood, Huong loved pole pushing and won a gold medal at the Phu Dong Sports Festival in Vinh Phuc province when she was in secondary school. After that, she was recruited to the Vinh Phuc Sports Training and Competition Center to practice freestyle wrestling professionally. However, Vinh Phuc wrestling soon disbanded, forcing Huong to change her sport to rowing, focusing on canoeing. At the 32nd SEA Games, Huong was selected to join the traditional rowing team and won three gold medals.
Meanwhile, in the Olympic rowing qualifying round – Asian region in Korea, Pham Thi Hue participated in the final of the women's heavyweight single sculls, competing with rowers from Japan, Philippines, Uzbekistan, Iran and Singapore. Pham Thi Hue finished first and won the only ticket to the 2024 Paris Olympics.
This is the result of Pham Thi Hue's efforts over the past decade. Previously, the rower born in 1988 had twice qualified for the 2016 and 2020 Olympics, but the regulations only allowed each country to choose one event to participate in. In the end, the women's lightweight double sculls were selected to participate in both events.
In 2024, the Olympics will change to allow each country to participate in a maximum of two events, but Vietnam missed out on the women's lightweight double sculls. The event took the top two spots to the Olympics, but the athlete pair Luong Thi Thao and Dinh Thi Hao finished fourth in the qualifying round.
Pham Thi Hue (third from right) won a ticket to the Olympics in the women's heavyweight single sculls rowing event. Photo: Canoeing & Rowing Vietnam
Pham Thi Hue was born in Quang Binh, then went to Hanoi to practice rowing with the national team at the West Lake Rowing Club. Hue became an excellent rower, winning two silver medals at the 2013 ASIAD and six gold medals at the SEA Games. Her memorable moment was winning a gold medal at the 2015 SEA Games while she was four months pregnant.
Previously, Vietnamese rowers participated in the Olympics four times, all in the women's lightweight double sculls, including Pham Thi Hien - Nguyen Thi Thi in 2004, Pham Thi Hai - Pham Thi Thao in 2012, Ho Thi Ly - Ta Thanh Huyen in 2016 and Dinh Thi Hao - Luong Thi Thao in 2020.
Currently, Vietnamese sports have eight official slots for the 2024 Paris Olympics. The previous six slots include Nguyen Thi That in women's road cycling, Trinh Thu Vinh in women's 10m air pistol, Le Thi Mong Tuyen in women's 10m air rifle, Nguyen Huy Hoang in men's 800m freestyle, Vo Thi Kim Anh in women's 54kg boxing and Trinh Van Vinh in men's 61kg weightlifting.
Huy Hoang has also achieved the B standard for the men's 1,500m freestyle to be on the Olympic reserve list. In addition, tennis player Nguyen Thuy Linh is almost certain to participate in women's singles badminton, along with the hope of Le Duc Phat in the men's singles.
Hieu Luong
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