PH fencers grab 2 golds in Taiwan tilt

SOPHIA Shekinah Catantan, the youngest sister of fencing star Samantha, lived up to her family’s reputation by taking one of two golds that Filipino fencers won in the 1st Hefeng National Junior Fencing Championships in Taiwan over the weekend.

The 13-year-old Sophia joined Canlas Fencing top bet Marcus Antonio Manuel in grabbing the top honors at stake in the 17-under women’s foil and the 15-under men’s foil action, respectively.

The young Catantan fought off Li Zhixian, 15-4, in the final round to claim the top honors.

Her feat comes three months after she took home the top honors in the girls’ division of the 85th University Athletic Association of the Philippines tournament while playing for University of the East.

Manuel turned back Zhang Tingzhou, 15-10, for the gold medal, his second podium finish.

He got one of the two silvers that the Philippines won after settling for a runner-up finish to David Bishay of Olympic Fencing, 10-15, in the 17-under men’s foil finals.

Vereza Boy claimed the other silver medal after bowing to Yu Chaeyung, 6-15, in the 17-under women’s sabre event.

Boy reached the gold-medal round after hurdling Filipino fencer Kyra Cleto, 15-11.

Yunna Canlas, who took a bronze medal, marched to the 11-under women’s foil semifinals with her 15-11 win over Chenwei Du, before Alisa Chen stopped her, 2-10, to reach the finals.

Alyssa Villacin snared a second bronze with her 10-9 triumph over We Penghe in the quarterfinals of the 9-under women’s sabre, and a 3-10 setback to Wang Man, 3-10.

Victoria Ebdane and Catantan also finished with bronzes in the 15-under women’s foil.

Also claiming bronze medals were Jodie Tan in the 13-under women’s foil and Leeroi Chan in the 11-under men’s foil.

Youngsters numbering 50 from various clubs and schools in the Philippines joined the weekend-long meet.

This includes entries from the Canlas Fencing Academy and Republic Fencing, who competed in the three weapons of fencing – foil, epee and sabre.

BRICE Baisa kept his dominant run in the Palawan Pawnshop junior tennis circuit, sweeping the boys’ 16- and 18-and-under crowns in the Zentro National Championships in Apalit, Pampanga over the weekend for his sixth straight two-title romp.

Sustaining his superb brand of play, the third-ranked Baisa, 16, toppled top seed Frank Dilao, 6-0, 6-3, to rule his age-group category in the Group I tournament presented by Dunlop then lived up to his top billing in the premier class with a decisive 6-1, 6-1 victory over the No. 2 Dilao at the Zentro Recreational Events courts. The Puerto Princesa find thus stretched his record run following his domination of the Iloilo, Roxas City, Bacolod, Imus and Cainta, Rizal legs of the country’s longest talent-search put up by Palawan Pawnshop president/CEO Bobby Castro.

Bautista also stamped her class in the girls’ side, yielding just four games in three matches to clinch the 16-U trophy, capped by a 6-1, 6-1 win over Ave Policarpio in the finals. The Imus, Cavite ace proved a lot tougher in 18-U play, giving up just two games against three rivals to reign, including a 6-0, 6-1 rout of Althea Liwag in the championship to share MVP honors with Baisa.

Also posting top podium fin- ishes in the week-long tournament, backed by ProtekTODO, PalawanPay, the Unified Tennis Philippines and UTR (Universal Tennis Rating), are 14-U winners Aljhon Rombawa and Cadee Dagoon, 12-U champions Dean Palaroan and Ayl Gonzaga, and 10-unisex titlist Andrei Torrente.