Catantan injured, settles for fencing silver

By Peter Atencio

PHNOM PENH —Defending champion Samantha Catantan injured her knee after securing a seat in the finals, thereby settling for a silver medal in the 32nd Southeast Asian Games' fencing tournament at Hall D of the OCIC Wedding Center in Chroy Changvar District here.

Catantan’s woes started when she fell on the mat, moments after securing a point that sent her into the women’s foil finals.

A cartilage seemed to have popped behind the back of her left knee when she moved after she lunged at semis foe Kemei Chung of Singapore.

After a short rest, Catantan still found the courage to continue as she took the last two points to beat Chung, 15-6, and set up a return showdown with her last year’s opponent Maxine Wong, also of Singapore.

Sadly, Catantan never got to play a rematch with Wong, who eventually won the gold medal after the country’s top Filipina fencer conceded on the advice of her coach and medical personnel, who told her to not make her injury any worse.

Catantan, with her knee wrapped in bandage, followed the advice, and no longer fought Wong in what could have been an exciting finals rematch.

Samantha Catantan is attended to by medical personnel and fencing chief Rep. Richard Gomez.

”We’re still not sure about the injury. Pero, may pumutok nu'ng pag-atras ko Pag-bend ko ng knees ko, may pumutok. So most likely ACL. Pero, kanina, nakatayo pa ako. So, hopefully, it's not something serious. Kasi, very important po itong year sa akin, para mag-qualify sa Paris Olympics,” said Catantan, who fought back tears, after she was wheeled back to the auditorium to meet Wong, and formally concede the gold to the Singaporean on top of the fighting platform.

National coach Ramil Endriano said they were waiting for the showdown with Wong to happen again.

“Inaabangan namin ang rematch nila. Kasi sila rin ang naglaban sa finals last year. Tapos, nangyari ito,” said Endriano, who added that this is the first time for Catantan to have such an injury.

Catantan, who flew from the United States days before her matches, was in good shape when she swept her five-game assignment in the pool stage.

After that, she won over Vietnamese bet Luu Thi Thanh Nhan, 15-2, in the quarterfinals before facing Chung.

Philippine Fencing Association president Richard Gomez, who was in the crowd with Philippine Sports Commission commissioner Wawit Torres, felt heartbroken on Catantan’s situation. They were at her side with her sister Janna Catantan, when Sam was getting medical treatment.

“It’s very heartbreaking for me to see my athletes not able to compete in the finals. It’s painful for me to see our athletes giving up the gold that’s supposed to be ours,” said Gomez.

Tabuena outguns Alido, keeps Luisita trophy

TARLAC – Miguel Tabuena cashed in on a key two-shot swing on No. 12 to wrest control then outgunned Ira Alido in a clash of skills and nerves in the stretch to fashion out a 65 and retain the ICTSI Luisita Championship crown by two here Friday.

On the outside looking in majority of the way, Tabuena even fell by two strokes off Alido with a bogey on the first hole but found his touch and rhythm in time to engage the third round leader in a shootout after the duo detached themselves from a crammed leaderboard with torrid frontside assaults on the Luisita Golf and Country Club course.

When the smoke cleared, Tabuena emerged virtually unscathed and a winner again at the Robert Trent Jones, Sr.-designed layout the way he did when he repelled Clyde Mondilla in sudden death here last year.

“The turning point was actually when I caught Ira on the ninth hole, we were even after No. 9. But there were still so many holes left,” said Tabuena, who after a bogey start, rattled off five birdies in the next eight holes and tied Alido, who fired four birdies of his own in the same stretch, at 12-under overall.

But as Alido regained the lead with backto-back birdies to launch his backside bid against Tabuena’s birdie on No. 10, the latter countered with his own feat on the par-4 12th, which Alido bogeyed for a crucial two-shot swing that pulled the recent Asian Tour’s DGC Open winner ahead for the first time.

He never relinquished the lead, hiking it to two with another birdie on the next then after the duo traded bogeys on the tough No. 15, Tabuena birdied the par-5 16th to all but put the outcome beyond doubt.

He parred the last two to cap a brilliant closing 32-33 round for a 72-hole total of 14-under 274 on a course he calls home.

“It’s just something about this course where I feel very comfy. This is my fifth win at Luisita alone,” said Tabuena, who pocketed the top P360,000 purse out of the P2 million total prize in this fourth leg of this year’s Philippine Golf Tour.

“It’s something about the greens, the atmosphere, the history, the people watching every year. It feels like home and hopefully, I will have time to come back next year,” said Tabuena, who also saw a lot of promise from the 22-year-old Alido.

“Ira is a hell of a player, He just won a few months ago and he has big things coming for him,” added the former Philippine Open champion here in 2015, who also thanked ICTSI, Monde Nissin and Lexus for backing his campaign.

Alido birdied the last hole for a 68 and a 276, the runner-up finish still auguring well for the young campaigner, who rallied from five shots down to snatch the PGT Bacolod leg crown last March. He pocketed P236,000.

“Nothing really went wrong. I just had a couple of bad breaks. Overall it went really good. Miguel just played better,” said Alido. “We were going back and forth but there were some shots that I wished I could’ve taken them back.”

Fidel Concepcion likewise enhanced a promising career with a third place finish, charging back with a solid 66 spiked by a threebirdie binge from No. 13 for a 279 total while Mondilla sizzled with a five-birdie splurge in a six-hole stretch from No. 10 to fire a 66 and snare fourth place at 281.

The men’s 4x400m relay team of Frederick Ramirez, Michael Del Prado, Joyme Sequita and Umajesty Williams ended the country’s campaign in athletics with a much-needed victory, clocking 3:07.22 to edge the Thai squad (3:07.23) for the gold.

Athletics also delivered two more silver medals through the women’s 4x400m relay and javelin thrower Gennah Malapit, while wushu also contributed a silver courtesy of Gideon Padua in the men’s sanda event.

What appeared as a sure gold in fencing, courtesy of defending champion Samantha Catantan, turned into silver when she injured her knee in the semifinals while she was in the process of putting Singaporean Kemei Chung away in the women’s foil event.

On the advice of her coach and medical personnel, Catantan later conceded the gold to another Singaporean, Maxine Wong, the same fencer she beat for the title last year in Vietnam.

Counting the solitary gold medals delivered by Joseph Arcilla in the men’s singles event in soft tennis and by Eric Cray in the 400m hurdles in the last two days, the Pinoy contingent, backed by the Philippine Sports Commission and the Philippine Olympic Committee, improved its gold medal tally to 31 going into the last four days of action.

While Pinoy athletes continued to scrounge for gold medals, Vietnam sustained its drive to retain the overall championship it won in Hanoi last year, with Thailand and Cambodia making it a three-way race.

Indonesia and Singapore were running fourth and fifth, with the Philippines in sixth place, hardpressed to duplicate its fourth-place finish last year in Vietnam where it won 52 gold medals.

Another defeat in basketball, this time by Gilas’ women’s team to the Cambodian squad 68-89, continued to bring down the morale of the Pinoy bets, who watched in horror as Gilas Pilipinas absorbed a 68-79 defeat to Cambodia in men’s play last Thursday.

Gilas returns to action Saturday, favored to clinch a semis berth, against lowly-Singapore. Things are expected to perk up Saturday when four of the country’s boxers – Tokyo Olympian Irish Magno, two-time SEA Games champions Rogen Ladon and Ian Clark Bautista, along with Riza Pasuit – fight for gold medals, well aware they need to deliver to boost the country’s sagging campaign.

Five more pugs – Tokyo Olympics silver medalist Carlo Paalam, fellow Tokyo Olympics silver medalist Nesthy Petecio, Paul Julyfer Bascon, Fil-British John Marvin, and Petecio’s younger brother, Norlan – see action Sunday. Action in arnis, which is being held in the games for only the second time, gets going Saturday, with Pinoy bets favored to stamp their mark.

Pinoy fighters are also expected to contend for majority of the 17 gold medals to be disputed in kick boxing, which also starts Saturday.

President’s Cup Saturday at Wack Wack

WACK Wack Golf and Country Club will host Saturday the highly awaited return of the President’s Cup, one of the club’s premier tournaments honoring its incumbent head with a banner field looking to vie for trophies and fabulous raffle prizes.

Lawrence Tan, Wack Wack President, and the Board of Directors will headline the roster of the 144 members playing morning and afternoon at the East course in the afternoon while the sponsors and guests totaling 180 will tee off in the morning at the West layout.

A wide array of grand prizes is up for grabs in the 18-hole tournament, which is presented by San Miguel Corp., BMW, Boysen and Yakult, that includes P1-million cash, a BMW Motorcycle, Herman Miller Earnes lounge chair and ottoman and a three-day, two-night stay at El Nido (Lihim Resort Luxury Villa) with breakfast for two, airport transfers, 60-minute massage and personalized buttler.

Hole in one prizes are Lexus IS 300h car,Miitsubishi Xpande, Toyota Raize Turbo, Honda Brio, S-Presso, Cherry Tigo 5X, BMC 400 GT, Harley Davidson Nighter Black, Aprilla SR GT200, Getgo golf cart, P100k cash from WFM, P200k worth K&G products,P100k Casino Filipino bet certificate, P100k Cork wine and 2 seaplane tickets.

Lexus and CWC are platinum sponsors while Steel Asia, OKBet and Paragon Trading and Services Corp. are diamond sponsors. Gold sponsors include First Sunday Group, Federal Land, Isuzu Gencars, Go for Gold, Luxury Car Manila, Ascent Development Construction, The Plaza and Aureo.

C2 SATURDAY, MAY 13, 2023

Joel D. Lacsamana, Editor E-mail: jdlacsamana@gmail.com