Seven athletes led by Southeast Asian Games gold medalist Melcah Caballero will see action in the 2021 World Rowing Indoor Championships to be held online on Feb. 23 to 27.
Caballero and her teammates were among the 935 finalists from 63 countries who earned berths in the said event following their performances at the Continental qualifiers recently.
The 2019 SEAG double gold medalist will battle in the lightweight women’s 500 meters after ruling the recent Asian trials with the best time of one minute and 40.6 seconds.
Other Filipino qualifiers were Joanie Delgaco and Mireille Qua in the under-23 women (500m), Joachim de Jesus in U23 lightweight men (500m), and Wylen Lu, Alyssa Go and Kyra Louise Sandejas in U23 lightweight women (500m).
This will be the first time since the tournament began four years ago that it would be held indoors and virtually. Like in the continental qualifiers, rowing machines will be hooked up to a race system to tally their records.
Caballero is using the tournaments as her preparations for the Asia Oceania Continental Qualifiers for the Tokyo Olympics. The qualifiers is set May 5 to 7 in Tokyo.