Kayla Sanchez’s third SEA Video games gold is ideal birthday present for dad

Competing for the fourth straight day within the 2025 Southeast Asian Video games, swimmer Kayla Sanchez stays a gradual power for the Philippines, which retains the crown within the girls’s 100m backstroke

CHONBURI, Thailand – Kayla Sanchez didn’t need to look far for additional motivation as she picked up her third gold medal within the 2025 Southeast Asian Video games.

Sanchez gifted her father Noel the proper current on his birthday following her triumph within the girls’s 100m backstroke closing on the SAT Swimming Pool in Bangkok on Saturday, December 13.

Competing for the fourth straight day, the 24-year-old remained a gradual power as she recorded 1:02.35, permitting the Philippines to retain the crown within the occasion after Teia Salvino received within the 2023 Cambodia version with a SEA Video games file time of 1:01.64.

Thailand’s Mia Millar completed behind Sanchez for the silver with 1:02.52, whereas Indonesia’s Flairene Candrea bagged bronze with 1:02.60.

“I’m speechless. It’s been a protracted competitors. I nonetheless have 4 extra occasions to go so I’m simply taking it day-to-day and I knew I needed to exit quick, simply preserve it collectively and keep calm within the final 50,” mentioned Sanchez. “It’s additionally my dad’s birthday as we speak so I wished to win this medal for him. I wished to win gold for the Philippines.” 

“My complete household is right here and meaning a lot to me that we get to share this expertise collectively.” 

After a smashing SEA Video games debut that noticed her anchor the girls’s 4x100m freestyle relay to the crown on Wednesday, December 10, Sanchez settled for a pair of silvers within the girls’s 50m backstroke and 200m freestyle the next day.

Falling in need of the title in these occasions lit a hearth underneath Sanchez, who has received gold medals in back-to-back days as she captured the highest prize within the girls’s 100m freestyle on Friday, December 12.

“I used to be actually heartbroken, I felt like I let myself down, I let the nation down, and the one factor I can do as an athlete is to concentrate on the following occasion. I’m so motivated to win extra golds,” mentioned Sanchez.

With 5 medals, Sanchez holds the excellence of being probably the most bemedalled Filipino athlete on this SEA Video games. She is predicted to provide extra within the final two days of the swimming competitors. – Rappler.com