THERE is no stopping Ernie Gawilan, the first Pinoy para swimmer to qualify for the 2016 Paralympics.
On Tuesday night, the 23-year old Dabawenyo born with underdeveloped extremities and orphaned at an early age, won the gold medal in the men’s 200-meter individual medley S8 event in another record-shattering performance in the 8th Singapore Para Games.
Gawilan, who also broke the 400-m freestyle event record on the wy to a gold medal on Monday, took off almost 10 seconds from the Games record in the 200-m IM with a clocking of 2:47.64, erasing the old standard of 2:56.41.
[See Philippine chessers strike gold in Asean Para Games]
Toh Wei Soong of Singapore finished a distant second in 3:05.55 while Dang Van Cong of Vietnam would up third in 3:16.39.
“Maganda ang preparasyon ko, sir. One year na training. Pinaghandaan talaga namin ito,” Gawilan told Spin.ph in an online interview from Singapore.
Gawilan, who has booked a ticket to the 2016 Rio Paralympics by virtue of breaking the Paralympics standard in the 400-m freestyle, brought his medal harvest to two gold and one silver in the 100-meter freestyle event where he lost by a hair to Singaporean rival Toh Wei Soong.
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