On Friday last week, the city of
Tokyo in Japan took the plunge that it had postponed to do on the same month
the year before. Despite an uncomfortable situation with new cases in the
COVID-19 pandemic, and with a number of citizens protesting that the event
should just be cancelled, the Summer Olympics launched in July 23, with spectacle
and pageantry and near-empty stands greeting the athletes of the world as they
paraded in. As the competitions began in earnest over the week, 19 sportsmen
and women from the Philippines waded in to try their luck to win Olympic medals
including the elusive gold. Here is their current status.
According to The Manila Bulletin, the first few days of events in the 2020-21
Tokyo Summer Olympic games saw the Philippine contingent give their best. For
some, it has led to higher prospects; for others, a quick stoppage following an
initial determined surge; and others still, only preliminary elimination. Over
the weekend some athletes would not advance in the preliminaries of their events.
The sole Filipino Taekwondo Jin, Kurt Barbosa, lost to South Korean Jang Jun on
Saturday, July 24. Jang then lost to a Tunisian opponent, foiling even the
possibility of fighting for bronze.
Barbosa was the first. He was
followed by Remedy Rule for the women’s 100-meter butterfly swim, ranking only
25th. She still has the 200-meter butterfly to contest. Also losing
while retaining one event to play in is the gymnastics golden boy, Carlos Yulo,
who finished 47th with 79.931 points for his favored event, the
floor exercises, owing to some bad landings. His Japanese coach has taken responsibility
for the subpar performance. Yulo however has qualified for the men’s vault
medal round, a feat that surprised him, though he is subdued in his estimates
to medal.
Cris Nievarez competed in men’s
single-scull rowing before the Olympics officially started, only to finish
outside of medaling territory and awaits only a semifinal C/D to cement his
placing. Likewise, Jayson Valdez ended up ranked 44 at the men’s 100-meter
rifle-shooting in another wipeout. Next, skateboarding makes its Olympic debut
in Tokyo, and the Philippines’ bet Margielyn Didal comes in off a gold-medal
finish at the 2018 Asian Games and 2019 SEA Games. She managed to advance to
the finals only to place 7th overall, outside the medal range. It
seemed fitting then that Japanese skateboarders would claim gold for both men
and women’s events.
With these results, it seems to
fall to the boxers to get the country somewhere soon in these Olympics. Carlo
Paalam (men’s flyweight) and Irish Magno (women’s flyweight) breeze through
their preliminaries to the Round of 16. While women’s featherweight bet Nesty
Petecio went even further to stand for the quarterfinals. All three are
awaiting their next fights.
Also awaiting their events to begin
are Rio 2016 silver medalist Hidilyn Diaz alongside teammate Elreen Ando for
women’s weightlifting. The same goes for women’s judoka Kiyomi Watanabe; men’s
freestyle swimmer Luke Gebbie, golfers Juvic Pagunsan, Bianca, Pagdanganan and
Yuka Saso; and finally track & field athletes Kristina Knott (women’s
200-m) and EJ Obiena (men’s pole vault).
Image courtesy of Rappler
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