Jittery or Not, I'm Ready For Tokyo 2020, Says Malaysian Diving Queen

KUALA LUMPUR, July 26 (Bernama) -- Despite being ‘seasoned’ in her field of sport, diving queen Pandelela Rinong Pamg admits that nervousness does catch up on her each time she prepares for a competition, but said that she has no option but to ignore the feeling or risk ending up with a bad performance. The Sarawak-born athlete said she chose to take a leisurely approach, and one way to lose the jitters is through her keen interest in Korean popular (K-pop) music and English songs. A year ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, the 26-year-old athlete wants to focus fully on training and wants to maintain her mental strength right to competition day. Pandelela Rinong grabbed her two berths in the quadruple Games through the recent 18th Fina Aquatics World Championships in Gwangju, South Korea in the women’s 10m platform events, individual and synchronised, with Leong Mun Yee. "I always tell myself if I feel nervous I might not do better so why should I feel nervous? I should just enjoy the competition and that makes my performances better. "After 2016 Rio Olympics ended, we started preparing for Tokyo right away. The Olympics is every athlete's dream so we did not want to wait and regret later. I feel like I am mentally stronger now compared to the previous Olympics and thanks to years of training and competing, I have more experience,” she told Bernama. Pandelela Rinong said this after appearing as a guest of Bernama News Channel's Nine11 talk show at Wisma Bernama here Thursday. At the World Championships recently, the national diving squad managed to booked three slots to the Tokyo Olympics. Besides Pandelela Rinong and Mun Yee, the third slot was claimed by Wendy Ng Yan Yee in the women’s 3m springboard event. For the record, the Bidayuh lass won her first Olympics medal at the London Olympics in 2012 after claiming the bronze medal in her pet event to become the first Malaysia’s female athlete to win a medal at the Olympics. Four years later at Rio de Janeiro Olympics, she put another feather in her cap by winning the silver medal in the women’s synchronised 10m platform event, partnering Cheong Jun Hoong. Meanwhile, Pandelela Rinong, who is fondly known as Lela among teammates, expressed hope that more national divers will be able to accompany her to Tokyo. She noted that the national squad have two more chances to secure slots to the 2020 Olympics via the Asian Diving Cup which will take place in Kuala Lumpur from Sept 6 to 8 and the Fina Diving World Cup in Japan from April 21-26 next year. "The Asian Diving Cup is the second qualifying round for the Olympics, so the national squad have to work harder and use the competition to clinch more slots to the Olympics. We can improve on our shortcomings in the previous world championships through our training stint in China," she said. The national diving squad will be leaving for Sichuan, China for a week-long training session next month ahead of the Asian Diving Cup Tournament. -- BERNAMA