Tuesday, September 08, 2008 Wushu bets off to China for 9th Sanshou World Cup By Roderick Osis
AFTER winning four medals in a special tournament during the Beijing Olympics, the Philippine wushu team does not plan to rest on its laurels and is now setting its sights on two major competitions.
The wushu bets resume their training as they gear up for the Sanshou World Cup in Harbin, China and the Trex Games in Busan Korea.
"Everything goes back to normal. In other words, we're back to reality...We'll start practicing on Monday," Benjie Rivera said last Friday morning at the University of the Cordilleras.
The RP sanshou team--composed of another bronze medallist Rivera (56 kilograms (kg)), Mary Jane Estimar (52 kg), Marianne Mariano (56 kg) and Jessie Aligaya-- will be at the Sanshou World Cup competition slated from September 17 to 19 in Harbin, China.
"I think we've got great chances of winning medals in the World Cup again because we still have that winning feeling from Beijing. Our will to win is also still there," said Mariano, who is nursing a troublesome right knee.
"Our desire to win is still there. I think we will have a good showing," said Mariano who, with her teammates and two officials, will leave for China on September 14.
The wushu squad is widely regarded as the saving grace of the disastrous Philippine campaign in the Beijing Olympics where the 15-man team went home empty-handed for the third straight Olympics.
Rivera and Mariano who got richer by over P1.5 million each from their Beijing performances are the only Olympians from Baguio in Beijing after the categories of other wushu players were not included such as Asian games silver and SEAGames gold medallist Edward Folayang in the 70-kg and Mark Eddiva, the recent gold medallist in the 65-kg category during the May 2008 7th Asian Wushu championship in Macau.
The 2008 Busan World TreX-Games is a global sport and cultural festival combining traditional and modern performances under the official patronage of the International Olympic Committee (IOC). The name TreX-Games comes from a combination of Tr for traditional, e for e-sports, and X from X-sports.
By blending traditional and modern sports and activities, the Busan TreX-Games will blur the boundaries between generations to create the world's biggest sport and cultural festival.
The Busan TreX-Games will be held from September 26 to October 2 with around 10,000 participants from over 100 countries with 20 different types of events in the three categories of traditional performances, e-sports and X-sports.
