Monday, June 09, 2008 Rama: The power to surprise By Karlon N. Rama Stage Five
A FAMILIAR figure met to greet me last week, Saturday, as I walked into a crowded Cebu Pistol and Rifle Association covered court to cover the first day of the 1st PNPAAAI Cup.
Dino Cinco, who I hadn’t seen in shooting rigs since last March, was grinning as he shook my hand. Dino’s biggest fan in the entire world—his dad, Simon—was to his left.
I have followed, in the manner other sports scribes closely track the careers of great athletes, Dino’s shooting pursuits for years. I must have written five dozen or so articles about his exploits since 2003.
He was the young upstart who rocked and continues to rock Cebu’s shooting community. He has consistently outgunned in the shooting range people twice his size, twice his age, and twice in years of experience.
In one way or the other, he is the most talked about shooting athlete in this island of nine cities and 44 municipalities. There are those who think highly of his exploits and, as is normal in the wide world of sports, those who train to someday unseat him.
He was a chubby-faced college freshman when I first saw him competing in a match sometime in 2003. He shot in the Open Division using a race gun by Limcat.
Three years later, with more shooting trophies than any other local shooter I’ve met, he discarded the gun, picked up a .40 cal. pistol from Para-Ordnance, and began competing with the big boys in the Standard Division.
In June of 2006, during the 3rd Gov. Lyndon Barbers Cup held in Surigao City, he landed first place. It was his first big match shooting while shooting standard.
It was while shooting in the Standard Division, stringing a few dozen trophies along the way, that word of his extraordinary exploits reached people in Armscor.
It eventually resulted in his becoming part of Team Armscor, the country’s premier practical shooting team.
In January of this year, using an Armscor Medallion 1911 his sponsor gave merely two days before, he clinched 1st place in the Mamang Pulis Cup.
Before that, he landed 12th place in the in the 2007 PPSA Nationals held in Davao City. Armscor won the team championship trophy.
Dino competed during the National Range Officers’ Institute Cup last April only shot in two stages. That was the last big event I saw him join.
So when I saw him during the PNPAAAI event, I took them to one side and asked what has been keeping them busy and why the long absence in the shooting circuit. Dino said something in response, something about new challenges.
To tell the truth, though, I couldn’t quite make out what he said.
My eyes were focused on what was on his right hip, riding on his jet black JR Speed race holster. The few working neurons I still have left between my ears told me it
was a swanking new STI Trojan chambered for the .45 cal. round.
It didn’t register at first. The Trojan is a single-stack nineteen-eleven. Then, it hit.
“Are you competing single stack?” I posed. “Yes,” he said.
Two days later, I received word from Supt. Efren Nemeño, warden of the Bagong Buhay Rehabilitation Center and a member of the event’s organizing committee. Dino topped the Standard Division Single-Stack category.
Moreover, he topped over 150 other shooters, many of whom shot the event with high capacity firearms, and landed third in the aggregate standings.
“Recoil was a challenge. It was hard to quickly get back on target for that second shot. And you had to reload a lot more (six times for a 32 round course). I had to be very careful planning my game. It helped that Glenn Diaz did a very good job in tuning the gun,” he said when I caught him on the phone after getting the good news.
This shooter simply has the power to surprise.
PNPAAAI CUP. Minus the delay in the release of the scores, a small matter in the entire course of things, the 1st Philippine National Police Academy Alumni Association Inc. Cup, which ran from May 31 to June 1, was a thundering success.
