SEA Games 2025: Singapore’s fencers celebrate perfect day with three golds

BANGKOK – Facing a partisan home crowd, and with the added pressure of having seen her teammates win two earlier titles, Singapore fencer Juliet Heng found herself trailing home favourite Tonkhaw Phokaew 12-14 in the women’s individual sabre final.

She said inside the dimly lit Fashion Island Shopping Mall’s Island Hall: “I can’t lie. I watched Raphael (Tan), and he fenced so good. I watched Elle (Koh) and Kiria (Tikanah Abdul Rahman), and that was a confirmed gold, and I was thinking, ‘If I don’t win, there won’t be Majulah Singapura for my part’.

“Then I told myself, ‘No, no, no, I have to lock in. Okay, okay, let’s go sing Majulah Singapura’, and then I made it.”

Remarkably, with her back against the wall, Heng won the next three points to silence the crowd, defend her SEA Games crown and cap a campaign in which she had to bounce back from defeats in the pool stage.

Then, she lost 5-0 to Filipina Charmaine Andres and 5-4 to Tonkhaw to make it to the table of eight as only the fifth seed. But she then came back strong to get past teammate Christine Tan 15-10 and went on to beat the two opponents she had lost to earlier, overcoming Andres 15-7 in the semi-finals before her final heroics.

Vietnam’s Phan Thi Thu Hoai and Andres shared the bronze.

Heng, a final-year business student at Singapore Sports School-Ngee Ann Polytechnic, said: “Today started out so bad and I didn’t fence that good at the start. I was lying down in my box and not thinking of anything because I was so nervous and fed up with my pool’s result.

“To be honest, when it was 12-14, I thought I was cooked. But I told myself to take it one point at a time. Honestly, I don’t remember how the last point went. I just know it went silent and then I turned around and I hit.”

It has been a standout year for the 20-year-old who clinched a historic silver at the Asian Fencing Championships in June.

Thanking the support team from her school, family and national team, she felt she has improved on her mental strength after extra sessions with a sports psychologist while training for a month in Paris.

She added: “We kept talking about how if you are strong mentally, you will make it regardless of whatever you’re doing. I knew the Thai crowd was going to be crazy and I had to zone out to zone in. I worked so much and my mental aspect has grown so much and at this point, it was about trusting it.”

Heng’s victory was one of three Singapore celebrated on a perfect first day of fencing competition.

Koh, still only 18, made it three SEA Games women’s individual epee titles when she beat teammate and 2019 winner Kiria 9-8 after extra time.

Vietnam’s Nguyen Phuong Kim, who beat Koh in the pool stage but lost to her in the semi-final, shared bronze with Thailand’s Natpapat Sangngio.

In a tentative final in which both Singaporeans received a yellow and red card for passivity following one-minute spells with no points scored, Koh opened up small leads through the first nine minutes only to be pegged back by 25-year-old Kiria.

But she managed to remain calm, cooling herself with an ice pack and sipping cola during the break in between the three three-minute periods, and scored 33 seconds into sudden death.

Sporting red streaks in her hair, she said: “The semi-final was very pivotal because I wanted my spot in the final and I needed to take revenge for my loss. In the final, I was more relaxed fencing my teammate.

“Winning gold three times is quite unbelievable. Of course, I hoped for this, but it is really surreal.

“Back then, I was young and there was nothing to lose. Now that I’m older, it feels like there’s something to lose, and that’s a mentality I need to change. But the experience definitely helps. I know tactically what I want to do and avoid. I’m glad I stayed strong and defended my lead.”

While Heng and Koh are repeat winners, Tan marked his Games debut with a men’s individual foil gold after beating Notethakod Wangpaisit 15-11.

Qualifying for the table of eight as the third seed, the 20-year-old beat Malaysia’s Kaerlan Kamalanathan 15-8 and then 23-year-old teammate Jonathan Lim, who shared bronze with Filipino Nathaniel Perez, by the same score to advance to the final where he held his nerve at 11-11 to win four straight points to seal victory.

Tan said: “I don’t really feel the pressure of the home crowd. More so, I feel more emboldened by the supporters from Singapore, my family, my coach, all them cheering me on and trying to encourage me through their loud voices.”

“While waiting for the final to start, I had a short lesson with my coach where we went through tactical strategies on what to do. For example, we were going to pressure him more into attacking, because he is very comfortable in defence,” he recalled.

“Taking him out of his comfort zone and then exploiting his weaknesses was how I managed to take over the bout. When the scores were close, nerves did get to me but I had the unwavering confidence that I was going to take a stand right there and I was going to take over.”

At the 2023 SEA Games, Singapore won a record seven out of 12 fencing gold medals in Cambodia. These comprised triumphs in the men’s epee and foil individual events, as well as the women’s epee and foil individual and team, and sabre individual events.