Siti Zalina Ahmad has helped pioneer the way for Malaysia to become a leading bowls nation following their hosting of the 1998 Commonwealth Games. After watching a game of hockey in 1995, she saw a lawn bowls match and decided to take up the sport.
Blessed with a meticulous delivery developed under guidance from Malaysia’s inaugural coach Robbie Dobbins, ‘Lina’, as she is known throughout the bowls world, soon acquired a reputation as one the most consistent bowlers on the world scene, and her first Commonwealth Games title came in 2002 in Manchester. Four years later, in 2006, she successfully defended her title in Melbourne, and she was hotly tipped to win it for a third time in succession in New Delhi in 2010. Without dropping a set, she won all ten of her group games, only to lose to England’s Natalie Melmore in the semi-final – a defeat that brought her eight-year reign as champion to an end.
Lina won the New Zealand Open National Singles title in 2008 and has been a role model for generations of Malaysian women to play bowls. Siti Zalina is one of only two women to have won two Commonwealth Games singles gold medals.
Record:
- Commonwealth Games: ’98 (fours bronze), ’02 (singles gold), ’06 (singles gold), ’18 (pairs gold), 22 (singles bronze)
- World Bowls Championships: ’08 (singles bronze)
- Asia Pacific golds: ’03 (pairs), ’09 (pairs), ’11 (singles)
- World Bowls Indoor Championship: ’15
