Five Records Fall as Akmal Danial Shoots 700

There are days when a scoreboard stops being a list of numbers and starts reading like a statement of intent. The opening day of the compound event at Sukan Malaysia XXII was one of them. At its centre stood Akmal Danial bin Baharuddin — who opened with 351, enough on its own to equal the single-distance SUKMA record, and then closed with 349 to arrive at a total that had never been shot at these Games.

By the time the range at INSPEN fell quiet, five new SUKMA records had been set across the individual, team and mixed team events, with a sixth equalled — and the compound competition had claimed the opening day entirely for itself.

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Akmal Danial’s Historic 700

Seven hundred is the kind of number that reorders a competition around it. It sits three points clear of the next man and eight clear of the old record — a benchmark Afiq Zufar Mohamad Shah had needed until 2024 to set, and which Akmal Danial erased in a single afternoon. His first distance of 351 already equalled the 36-arrow record that Sabah’s Eugenius Loh Foh Sun had held since 2018. His second — 349 — merely confirmed what the first had suggested: this was not a fortunate score. It was a controlled one.

Seven Past the Old Mark

The most revealing statistic of the day was not the record itself but how many archers rendered the old one obsolete. Afiq Zufar’s 692 had stood as the SUKMA benchmark since 2024. On Monday at INSPEN, seven men finished above it.

Had Afiq Zufar shot his record score in this field, he would not have made the top seven. Aiman Syafiq’s 697 beat it by five, Abdul Hanan’s 696 by four, Hiew Ichin’s 695 by three. Eason Lau and Muhammad Danish Nadzimuddin both cleared it by two on 694, and Muhammad A’rif A’fiq squeezed past by a single point on 693. Eighth-placed Zhorif Fahim fell one short on 691.

Catherine Looi’s Double Record

If Akmal Danial owned the men’s headline, Sabah’s Catherine Looi Mei Qi took the women’s — and did it twice over, from a position nobody would have predicted. After the first distance she sat fourteenth, her 336 leaving her seven points adrift of Sarawak’s Wee Yee Qi, who led on 343. What followed was the single best distance shot by any woman on the range.

Her 347 in the second distance broke a record that had stood for sixteen years — the 345 shot by Perak’s Saritha Cham Nong at SUKMA Melaka in 2010 — and carried her from fourteenth to first. Her total of 683 then toppled the 72-arrow mark of 681, set by Terengganu’s Nurul Syaza Husna as recently as 2024. Two records, one archer, one afternoon, and a climb of thirteen places to claim top seed.

Behind her the women’s field was desperately tight. Perak’s Puteri Qaira Qistina finished a single point back on 682; Kelantan’s Nur Auni Wafiy and Melaka’s Nur Balqis Farhanah tied on 678 apiece — congestion that promises tense elimination matches to come.

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Terengganu’s Team Statement

The record-breaking did not stop at the individuals. With Akmal Danial joined by Muhamad Bilal Mubeen and Aiman Syafiq, Terengganu’s men posted 2,087 over 216 arrows — a new SUKMA team record, eclipsing Perak’s 2,064. Sarawak followed on 2,066 and hosts Selangor on 2,059, but the day belonged unmistakably to the men in Terengganu colours.

The women’s team went a different way. Sarawak led — Aira Nadirah, Nur Zara Aisyah, and Wee Yee Qi combining for 2,008 to edge Selangor by ten and Terengganu by fifteen. No record fell on the women’s side, but the top of a tight table was claimed all the same.

Mixed Team: A Record Decided by Inches

The mixed team produced the finest margin of the day. Perak’s Puteri Qaira Qistina and Abdul Hanan, and Sabah’s Catherine Looi and Hiew Ichin, both fired 1,378 — and both beat the old SUKMA mixed record of 1,372 set by Terengganu in 2024. The pair could not be separated on the total. Perak took top spot and the record billing on the tiebreak; Sabah were left with a matching score and second place.

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The Upset Already Brewing

Qualification is only the seeding. The head-to-head rounds that followed produced the day’s most human story, and it belonged to a man ranked twenty-first. Pulau Pinang’s Mevnesh Rethinakumar had no business reaching the semifinals on paper. He got there the hardest way imaginable — twice walking to the single-arrow shoot-off, twice against a higher seed, twice coming away the winner.

First he tied fifth seed Eason Lau at 142 and won on the closer arrow. Then he tied fourth seed Hiew Ichin at 146 — a huge score to force a shoot-off at all — and edged that too, a ten against a nine. Two of the top five seeds, gone, both by inches, both to the same man from Pulau Pinang.

His reward is a semifinal against Akmal Danial — the man of the day, who had reached the last four by a route with its own edge to it. In the quarterfinal, Akmal Danial met Muhamad Bilal Mubeen Mohd Izuan, his own Terengganu teammate and a fellow member of the record-breaking men’s team. He won 146–141. In the other half, second seed Aiman Syafiq faces Pulau Pinang’s Lee Meng Zhe, keeping Terengganu’s double threat alive going into the medal rounds.

The women’s draw offered its own tension at the top. Catherine Looi, the record-setter, needed a shoot-off of her own to survive Pahang’s Yasmin Amani in the quarterfinal — 138 each, settled 10 to 8 — and now meets Sarawak’s Wee Yee Qi in the last four.

The other half produced the highest score of the women’s bracket. Selangor’s Nur Alyaa Nazurah, seeded sixth, shot 146 to eliminate third seed Nur Auni Wafiy of Kelantan 146–142 — a performance that arrived from nowhere and announced the host state as a genuine medal threat. She now meets second seed Puteri Qaira Qistina in the semifinal.

What Comes Next

The medals are not yet decided, and the schedule splits them across three days. The individual semifinals and finals are set for 20 August, with the women shooting first from 08:30 and the men’s gold medal match closing the session at midday. The team events run separately — the men’s and women’s team quarterfinals open on 19 August, with the team semifinals and finals held over to 21 August.

But the opening day has already handed the competition its defining images: a 700 that had never been shot before, a Sabah archer breaking a sixteen-year-old record on her way to breaking another, a Terengganu team rewriting its own benchmark, and a twenty-first seed shooting his way into the final four one perfect arrow at a time. Whatever the medal days bring, the record book has already been rewritten.