A Star Swimmer
May 7, 2008
Fraidden Dewan, 22, is an Iban, a Sea Dayak from Sarawakâs 20 indigenous groups.
He is the star swimmer of the Sarawak team that is in Kuala Lumpur for the
14th paralimpiad games, 3 to 9 May.
Eight years ago, when he was helping his father cut down a tree, in his village,
Mukah, near Sibu, he slipped on wet grounds while the tree was crushing down.
The tree fell on his lower left leg and crushed it. It had to be amputated.
He only took up swimming as a sport for the disabled in 2002 and since then
he has been selected to be part of the national team. He is in individual as well
as team events and he is here to show his swimming skills. Catch him and his
team mates in action at the Bukit Jalil sport complex today.
One of his problem outside the swimming pool is the difficulty of getting a
job in his town or near by Kuching. He is now a father of a two year old son
and has a young family to support.
At the moment he lives his family and his father is an odd job worker and the
family income is not predictable. What he wished for, at the moment, is to get
some professional training and to get a good job and to continue swimming and
may take part in the Olympics, in the future.
Last photo: from the left, Fraidden, Stanley, Zam, Zul Amirul
August 19, 2009 at 8:42 am
KUALA LUMPUR: Participating in the same event for four consecutive Asean Para Games eventually proved fruitful for national paralympic swimmer, Fraidden Dawan.
Fraidden, 23, did not expect to win the gold and create a new meet record in the 400m freestyle S10.
He clocked 5 minutes 7.78 seconds in the swimming event which started today at the National Aquatic Centre, Bukit Jalil, here, erasing the record of 5:16.52s held by Hadee Pawan from Thailand.
Meanwhile, Hadee who participated to defend his gold medal and record achieved at the Korat meet in Thailand last year, had to be contented with the silver when he clocked 5:16.90s. The bronze medal went to Eric Villanueva from the Philippines.
“I could not believe that I could swim so well today. I have participated in this event four times and only managed to win the silver in the past,” the athlete from Bintulu, Sarawak told Bernama.
Fraidden said he would now put in more effort to enable him to go further in sports.
“I intend to compete at the London Paralympic Games (2012) and for this purpose, I have to work harder.
“Previously, when I started to participate in swimming, it was merely for fun. Now, I begin to see that athletes like us (the disabled) can also go far in sports and not merely for recreation. Now, I am being trained at the National Sports Council and this has helped me a lot in improving my performance,” he said.
Besides the 400m freestyle event, Fraidden together with his three teammates — David Kangyu Kulek, Nik Mohd Tarmizi Nik Mohd Nor and Mohd Zamry Sapiee — won the bronze in the 4×100m medley today.
Fraidden is also competing in the 50m butterfly stroke and 200m freestyle events.
2009/08/16 – BERNAMA