The fisherman Anh Vien – the last dream in the Olympics?

Perhaps never before has Anh Vien stepped into a big playground that is less talked about than the Tokyo Olympics, where swimmer Nguyen Huy Hoang is more expected. Since the 2011 SEA Games, it has been 10 years since Anh Vien represented Vietnam to attend a sports festival or international tournament. The 25-year-old fisherman has won 66 medals of all kinds, of which 44 are gold, 11 silver and 11 bronze.

She was the most successful in the SEA Games with 25 gold medals, ranked fifth in the list of the most successful athletes in the history of the Games. The original Can Tho fisherman also won the Asian championship, won the FINA World Cup silver medal and the Asiad bronze medal. Only the two highest levels that Anh Vien has yet to win a medal is the World Championship and the Olympic Championship.

Anh Vien’s 25 years old is not young compared to the peak of female swimmers. The eight women’s 200m freestyle finalists in Rio 2016 had an average age of 22.75. The peak of female swimmers probably also falls in the early 20s, and Anh Vien is about to enter the second half of this age.

The last time Anh Vien created a personal record was also in 2017, when she was 21 years old. At the 29th SEA Games in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Anh Vien set five personal and national records. Since then, “Little Mermaid” has never crossed its limits.

Anh Vien comes to Tokyo 2021 with two B standards, 200m and 800m freestyle. In the 200m freestyle, she earned the last spot with a time of 2 minutes 00.75 seconds in SEA Games 30, only 0.05 seconds faster than the B standard. With 800m freestyle, Anh Vien’s result was 8 minutes 48.65 seconds, 0.11 seconds more than B standard. Anh Vien’s standard results in these two events ranked 25th and 30th respectively among the athletes attending the 2021 Olympics.

Anh Vien has brought many records for swimming in Vietnam, such as the first medal at the Asiad in Incheon 2014, or the Asian gold medal in Tokyo 2016. If she wants to continue to be the first Vietnamese swimmer to pass the heat at the Olympics. , Anh Vien needs to break personal records.

Anh Vien’s chance in the 200m freestyle is higher, when this content takes 16 swimmers to the semi-finals. In Rio 2016 and the 2019 world tournament, the heat through heat was 1 minute 57.74 seconds and 1 minute 59.18 seconds, respectively. If the result is about 1 minute 57 seconds, Anh Vien will have hope to enter the semi-finals of this content. But, her personal record of 1 minute 58.82 seconds was set in June 2016.

*Anh Vien’s achievements compared to the results of the heat rounds in the Olympics and World Championships

content	Nearest	Average of the last three awards	Personal record	Through heat Olympic 2016	Through the heat of World Championships 2019
200m freestyle	2:05.12 (October 2020)	2:03.18	1:58.82 (June 2016)	1:57.74	1:59.18
800m freestyle	9:00.85 (October 2020)	8:56.42	8:34.85 (June 2015)	8:25.55	8:29.70

Anh Vien’s forte is the medley swimming style, when she was ninth in the heat lap of the 400m medley event in Rio 2016. But if she only focuses on practicing freestyle swimming, she can improve her performance or improve her performance. even surpassing personal records. However, Anh Vien still has many opportunities to compete for medals in more suitable arenas such as SEA Games 31 or Asiad 2022.

Xuan Binh