SINGAPORE, Dec 8 — Oregon-based distance runner Soh Rui Yong has qualified for the 2015 SEA Games after clocking a time of 2hr 26min 01sec (unofficial timing) at the California International Marathon early this morning.
The University of Oregon undergraduate finished fifth in the men’s 20- to 24-year-old category, and was placed 38th overall. Soh’s time of 2:26:01 — the season’s fastest time by a Singaporean — also qualifies him for next year’s SEA Games, as the mark is set at the 2013 Games’ bronze medal time of 2:30:30.
Soh, 23, is set to join newly-crowned Standard Chartered Marathon Singapore local men’s winner Mok Ying Ren at the SEA Games, with Mok aiming to defend the gold medal he won in a time of 2:28:36 in Myanmar in 2013.
A national record holder in the men’s 10,000m, Soh’s debut in the marathon puts him second on the men’s marathon all-time best by a local runner, just behind Murugiah Rameshon’s national record time of 2:24:22 clocked in Chiangmai in 1995. — TODAY
