SEA Games: PH Olympic hopeful Carter Lilly botches 800m gold bid

Carter James Lilly of the Philippines reacts after Vietnam’s Van Thai Duong came up to him from behind durng 800 men’s run at the 30th Southeast Asian Games in Clark City. INQUIRER/ MARIANNE BERMUDEZ

NEW CLARK CITY — Olympic slot-chaser Carter Lilly of the Philippines bungled a big lead almost throughout the race to settle for silver in the men’s 800-meter run Monday in the 30th Southeast Asian Games.

Lilly was leading by as far as 10 meters at one point, but allowed Duong Van Thai to sneak in going into finish line to settle for silver.

“I need to go back and get better next time,” said Lilly at the mixed zone. “Obviously it’s disappointing but you know.”

Lilly’s personal best is one minute and 46.95 seconds, which was faster than the SEAG mark of 1:48.29.

The 24-year-old from Iowa was looking to make the Olympic cut of 1:45.20.

Thai took the gold with a time of 1:49.91, Lilly checked in at 1:50.17, while Malaysian Vincent Royson was third 1:51.48.