Team Singapore will be making its 17th summer Olympic Games appearance in Tokyo 2020. And that's with 23 athletes competing in a record number of sporting disciplines (12) in this Olympiad.
Headlining the 80-strong contingent of athletes and officials will be the Republic’s first and only Olympic gold medallist, Joseph Schooling. The 26-year-old will be competing in the Men’s 100 meters freestyle and defending his 100m butterfly title, which he won in Rio 2016. That's after he met the “A” qualifying mark of 51.96s in the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games in 2019.
Heading into his 3rd Olympic campaign, the 2-time World Championship bronze-medalist has his work cut out, if he is to reprise his title winning form in the last edition. His season’s best time of 52.93s in his pet event ranks him 151st, more than two seconds behind American front-runner Caleb Dressel, who clocked the year’s fastest time of 49.76s in the local Olympic team trials on 18 June 2021.
Joining Schooling in the Tokyo Aquatics Centre are the Quah siblings Zheng Wen and Ting Wen, who are also competing in their 3rd Olympic campaigns. In Rio 2016, Zheng Wen reached the semi-finals of the Men’s 100m and 200m butterfly events.
This time round though, the 24-year-old will be competing in 3 individual events, adding the Men’s 100m backstroke to the two butterfly events he competed in the last Olympiad, 5 years ago in Brazil.
His sister Ting Wen qualified for Tokyo 2020, through the universality quota as the top-ranked local female swimmer. The 28-year-old multiple SEA Games gold medallist, who swam for DC Trident in the 2019 and 2020 International Swimming League seasons, will be hoping to go beyond the preliminaries in the Women’s 50m and 100m freestyle events respectively.
Also hitting the waters – but at the Odaiba Marine Park – is Chantal Liew, who'll be competing in the Women’s 10-kilometer Open swimming event on 4 August. She qualified as the best non-Japanese Asian finisher with a time of 2 hours, 12 minutes and 19.50 seconds (2:12:19.50) in the FINA Olympic Marathon Swim Qualifier 2021 on 19 June.
The 22-year-old, who has also represented the nation in pool events in the 2018 Asian Games, won silver in the event in the 2017 SEA Games in Malaysia. Chantal also recorded her personal best of 2 hours 3 minutes 31.30 seconds in the FINA Marathon Swim World Series in Qatar in 2019.
Switching over to racket sports and making her 4th successive Olympic campaign, Feng Tianwei is Singapore’s most experienced and bemedalled athlete, heading to Tokyo. The 34-year-old table-tennis player previously won a Women’s team event silver medal in Beijing 2018, plus two bronze medals from the team and individual events, 4 years later at the London Olympiad.
Joining her in the team event at the Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium are Yu Mengyu and Lin Ye. 31 year old Yu, who had won multiple Commonwealth and SEA Games gold medals, will be competing in her second Olympics alongside Feng in the women’s team and individual events. And 25-year-old Lin will be making her Games debut and feature in the team event.
Clarence Chew is the first local-born paddler to make his Olympic debut in the Men’s singles after he defeated compatriot Koen Pang in straight sets in an Olympic qualification tournament in Qatar on 23 March. The 25 year old is the reigning Silver medallist in the Men's Singles of the 2019 SEA Games.
Team Singapore will be represented in Fencing only for the second time since the Barcelona Games in 1992. Amita Berthier, the 2017 Cadet World Championship bronze medalist, will compete in the women’s individual foil in her Games debut after she won the Asia-Oceania Olympic Qualification tournament in Uzbekistan on 25 April.
She's also the defending Gold medallist from the 2019 SEA Games in Manila.
Joining Berthier in the Makuhari Messe Hall is Kiria Tikanah Abdul Rahman. Just like her compatriot, the 21-year-old student, who won the SEA Games Women’s individual epee gold in 2019, earned her maiden Olympic spot, by topping the Olympic qualifying event in April in Uzbekistan.
Singapore will be represented in sailing for the tenth successive edition, with four sailors competing in three events at the Enoshima Yacht Harbour.
Amanda Ng will be competing in her second successive Olympics, this time in the women’s windsurfing RS:X category after she finished top of the Mussanah Open Championship 2021, which also served as the Asian and African Olympic qualifiers, in Oman in April. The 27-year-old auditor will be hoping to go one better as a soloist after she finished 20th with Jovina Choo in the women’s 470 in Rio 2016.
2018 Asian Games champions Kimberly Lim, 24, and Cecilia Low, 28, will make their Olympic debut in the Women’s 49erFX, after they clinched one of the six qualifying spots at the world championships in New Zealand on 8 December 2019.
24-year-old Ryan Lo qualifies for the Men’s Laser after he finished first in the Mussanah Open in Oman in April. The world number 10 becomes the second Lo sibling to compete in the Olympics after his sister Man Yi competed in the Women’s Laser Radial in Beijing 2008.
Badminton will be represented for a fifth successive edition with Games debutantes Loh Kean Yew and Yeo Jia Min competing in the Men’s and Women’s singles respectively. Both qualified through the Badminton World Federation Race to Tokyo rankings.
24-year-old Loh made his name in world badminton after upsetting Chinese legend Lin Dan to win the Thailand Masters in January 2019. The world number 42 is also the reigning Silver medallist at the 2019 SEA Games.
Winner of two World Tour tournaments, 22-year-old Yeo’s form heading to the Olympics has been mixed, winning one and losing two in official competitions.
Singapore will be represented in diving for the first time with Jonathan Chan and Freida Lim competing in the men’s and women’s 10-metre individual platform respectively.
Chan, who has previously won the 10m platform in the FINA Diving Grand Prix on home soil in 2018, earned his Olympic ticket after he won gold in his event at the Asia Diving Cup in Malaysia in September 2019.
A double runner-up finish in the FINA Diving Grand Prix 2017 in Puerto Rico, Lim qualified for her maiden Olympics through a reallocated slot. That's after she finished 15th in her event at the FINA Diving World Cup 2021 in Japan on 5 May.
The Republic makes its return in gymnastics after debuting in London 2012, with Tan Sze En set to feature in the Women’s individual all-around. The two-time national champion, who had featured in the 2018 Asian Games, qualified after clinching a reallocated spot following the world championships in Germany in October 2019.
Singapore will be featured in rowing for a second successive Olympics after Joan Poh earned her ticket to Tokyo. That's following her 12th-place finish in the Women’s single sculls in the World Rowing Asia and Oceania Olympic Qualification Regatta in May.
Equestrian will feature in the Republic’s Olympic program for the first time, after Caroline Chew met the qualifying score in the Dressage Grand Prix in France to qualify for the Games on 19 June.
Singapore will feature in the sport of shooting for the 9th successive Olympics, with Adele Tan set to feature in the women’s 10m air rifle event. The 2017 Asian Airgun Championship bronze medalist earned a place through internal selection after the republic’s second-place event finish in the Asian Shooting Championships in Qatar in November 2019.
2015 SEA Games gold medalist Shanti Pereira will make her Olympic debut in the women’s 200m, after she earned a universality place in athletics on 2 July.
The 32nd edition of the Olympic Games will begin on 23 July 2021.
For all coverage and news of the Republic's national athletes who'll be competing at the Games, check out the official Team Singapore website.