Monday, July 28, 2008 Cebuanos nab 23 golds in POF
THE Cebuanos had a productive campaign in the Visayas leg of the Philippine Olympic Festival as they came up with 18 gold medals at the pools and five from taekwondo in Dumaguete City.
Winning gold medals for taekwondo were Lord Jay Guia, Michael Realista, Lovely Lim, Karen Fontanilla and Arvin Festin, as they dominated in their respective divisions.
The silver medalists were Rovel Mendoza, Cathy Bas and Maris Balbona, while Richard Caingles will go home with a bronze medal. The team was coached by Raul Luna.
“The team is very busy this month. Our jins are competing almost every week,” said Philippine Taekwondo Association regional head Tony del Prado.
Cebu hosted the regional competitions the other Sunday, which attracted more than 300 jins. Next week, another batch of Cebuano jins will go to Manila to compete in the Poomsae event.
The Cebuano tankers, on the other hand, anchored by coach Rolando Alvarez, whisked 18 golds, five silvers and three bronze medals at the Teves Memorial Aqua Center.
Noel Cañeda and Paula Vega led the campaign with six and five golds, respectively.
Vega topped the Girls 15-17 division’s 200 meter IM, 200 m fly, 800 m free, 200 m back and in the 4x100 m free relay with her teammates.
Cañeda won the boys 15-17 age group’s 200m IM, 200 fly, 50m free, 1,500m free and in the 200m back.
Michael Ichiro Kong, competing in the nine-year-old division, dominated the 200m IM, 50m free and 100m back, as Anthony Lynn Navarro topped the 200 m IM and 100 m back of the 10 years old division. (MCB)
