‘Frog Prince’ Nguyen Huu Viet passes away
VOV.VN - Veteran swimmer Nguyen Huu Viet, who was respectfully dubbed the ‘Frog Prince’ due to his excellent breaststroke technique, passed away on March 25 after suffering an asthma attack.
Born in Hai Phong in 1988, the local athlete was widely considered to be the country’s top swimmer as he broke the country’s 40-year duck for a gold at the SEA Games, grabbing the men’s 100m breaststroke title at the 23rd SEA Games in the Philippines in 2005.
He later on to record two consecutive title defences at the SEA Games in Thailand in 2007 and Laos in 2009.
At the 26th Games in Indonesia held in 2011, Viet failed to make the podium in any of the swimming disciplines. Immediately after this disappointment, the three-time SEA Games champion decided to withdraw from the national swimming team in order to focus on his studies at the Ho Chi Minh City University of Physical Education and Sports and to deal with his troublesome asthma.
After his health recovered, Viet was able to reassert his absolute domination on the local swimming scene. Notably taking top honours in all three distances of the breaststroke events, including 50, 100, and 200 metres, at the 2013 National Swimming and Finswimming Championships, raising his domestic gold medal tally to 50.