Rio 2016

The 2016 Summer Paralympic which has taken place from 7 September to 18 September 2016 was held in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil. There were a total 4,342 athletes representing 159 National Paralympic Committee who took part in 22 various sports.

Singapore sent a contingent of 51 people (13 athletes, 32 officials and 6 secretariats) led by Chef-de-Mission Mr. Ho Cheng Kwee. This was by far the largest contingent that was sent for Team Singapore. The athletes competed in 6 out of 22 sports which were Archery, Athletics, Boccia, Equestrian, Sailing, Swimming.

Nurulasyiqah Taha (Boccia) was the selected as the pledge taker and Yip Pin Xiu (Swimming) was selected as flag bearer for the games. 

Through this platform, Singapore has managed to attain 2 Gold Medals and 1 Bronze Medal. This is achieved through the outstanding performance of Yip Pin Xiu who won 2 Gold Medals by setting a new World record of 2:07.09 in the Women’s 100m Backstroke S2 event and Theresa Goh who set a new Asian Record of 1:54.50 and won the Bronze Medal in Women’s 100m Breaststroke SB4 event.

It was the first time Singapore competed in the BC3 Mixed Paris event at the Paralympic Games with Nurulasyiqah Taha and Toh Sze Ning representing Singapore as a pair. Even though they lost to Greece   in the bronze medal match, they did extremely well in the preliminaries by winning against Greece who was 2012 Paralympic Games Gold Medalist and Portugal, 2012 Paralympic Games Silver Medalist.

Similarly, Singapore’s archery also made its debut. Nur Syahidah Bte Alim who represented Singapore won her match against her Canadian opponent who ranked 4th. However, she lost in the Quarter Finals against her Korean opponent in a close match of 135-137.