At the Edinburgh International meet last weekend, we saw the likes of superstars Adam Peaty and Ruta Meilutyte throw down impressive times in their respective breaststroke events, but another swimmer quietly made her own mark at the meet.
Yvette Man-yi Kong of Hong Kong scored two silver medals at the competition, finishing behind Meilutyte in the 100m breaststroke and runner-up to Siobhan-Marie O’Connor in the longer event. For Kong, however, the silvers might as well have been gold, as the 23-year-old registered two new National Records with her Edinburgh outings.
First, in the 100m breaststroke event, Man-yi Kong wrangled in a time of 1:07.88. She followed that up with a mark of 2:27.96 in the 200m event. Although both times sit outside the world’s top 20, they fall under the FINA Olympic “B” cuts of 1:10.22 and 2:32.08 respectively, giving the Hong Kong swimmer a solid chance of making it onto her nation’s Rio roster.
In the video interview, Man-yi Kong relays her excitement at the prospect of heading to an Olympic Games, while also giving a nod to her University of Edinburgh teammates and training environment whom she credits with pushing her to new best times.
