After her silver medal win, Ly competed in the women's 3,000m steeplechase final in the afternoon. She competed against seven other athletes, including record holder Nguyen Thi Oanh and veteran Doan Thu Hang.

After the first 2,000m, Ly began to tire, dropping to 5th place. However, in the final 1,000m, spurred on by the home crowd, she gradually moved up to third.

On the final day of the national championships, 13/8, Nguyen Khanh Ly, representing host city Da Nang, competed in three events.

In the women's 800m final at 7:50 a.m., Ly (number 442) competed against six other runners, including Nguyen Thi Thu Ha and Bui Thi Ngan (both from Ninh Binh), who were the top contenders and former SEA Games gold medalists.

With the home advantage, Ly led for 600m but was then overtaken by Thu Ha, who won the gold medal with a time of 2 minutes 12.37 seconds.

Ly was closely followed by Bui Thi Ngan, but with an extraordinary effort, the Da Nang runner crossed the finish line just ahead of Ngan, winning the silver medal by 0.03 seconds. Ngan stumbled and took the bronze.

This upgraded Ly’s medal from 2024, where she won bronze behind Thu Ha and Ngan. With a time of 2 minutes 13.41 seconds, Ly is being considered by the Vietnamese athletics team for selection to the 33rd SEA Games in Thailand later this year.

The Da Nang athlete maintained her pace to finish and win the bronze medal with a time of 11 minutes 08 seconds.

Ly was born in 2003 into a family of three sisters in Vinh Linh, Quang Tri province. As children, all three were passionate about volleyball but did not pursue it professionally. Ly left home at the age of 13 to go to Da Nang and train in athletics.

After resting for just over an hour, Ly and her teammates competed in the women's 4x800m relay.

In this event, Ninh Binh, with runners Vu Thi Tra My, Nguyen Khanh Linh, Bui Thi Ngan, and Nguyen Thi Thu, easily won the gold medal with a time of 8 minutes 55.26 seconds. The Hung Yen team also performed strongly, finishing in 9 minutes 9.48 seconds to take the silver. But the race for the bronze medal was a close contest between the remaining two teams, Quang Tri and Da Nang.

"After the steeplechase, my muscles were stiff, and I hadn't had time to recover. I even considered dropping out of this event. But I saw that we still had a good chance of competing for the bronze medal with Quang Tri, so I persevered," Ly told VnExpress.

Running the final leg, Ly did not disappoint her younger teammates, staying close behind Quang Tri's final runner, Tuong Khanh Bang, and then overtaking her just before the finish line. Da Nang won the bronze medal with a time of 9 minutes 15.01 seconds, 0.66 seconds faster than Quang Tri.

The entire Da Nang team burst into tears of joy alongside their coach, Nguyen Duc Thao, upon winning the bronze medal.

"Those were tears of happiness. The athletes are young, but we did it. This result shows that as long as the team has the will, we can achieve our goals," Ly said.

According to the 22-year-old runner, this final women's relay bronze medal was "as good as gold" because it helped the host team, Da Nang, tie with the Army team (both with five gold, six silver, and five bronze medals) for third place overall.

Ly proudly displayed the three medals she won in a single day. "This is the most brilliant birthday gift," she said on the morning of 14/8, her 22nd birthday.

She also said that she will be preparing to participate in the relay team event in Quang Ngai next week and then the 21km race at the VnExpress Marathon Nha Trang on 24/8.

Duc Dong