As I am writing this column, news comes in that Carlo Paalam has come up short of Olympic Gold as he lost via split decision to Yafai Galal of the UK.

Carlo suffered a knockdown in the first round and also lost the second on majority of the cards in the second round, turning the bout into a uphill battle from thereon. He won the third round on all the judges cards, but it was hardly enough to secure the victory.

PAALAM. Still it was in impressive run by Carlo leading up to the gold medal bout. He had dominant wins over Ireland’s Brendan Irvine, Algeria’s Mohamed Fliss and Shakhobidin Zoirov of Uzbekistan. In the semifinals, he outclassed Tanaka Ryomie.

Not bad for an obscure and scrappy kid from Cagayan de Oro whose first foray into fighting was all because of a bottle of Coke.

No shame of course in losing to Galal who has boxing pedigree in his genes. Two of his brothers are fighters who have held international titles professional boxing.

OLYMPIANS. Many have tried, but only three have come the closest to that elusive gold medal in boxing competition. I say that in the proper context of course, as a gold medal in any sport has been more than elusive for Philippine sports and that curse has been broken only now by Hidilyn Diaz.

But because boxing is traditionally our strongest suit, that gold has always been within reach but the struggle, never consummated. Mansueto “Onyok” Velasco won silver in the Atlanta Olympics in 1996 and Anthony Villanueva was the first to win a silver medal in boxing in the Tokyo games in 1964.

Paalam is now our third silver medalist in boxing. Of the 13 Olympic medals we have won in total, seven have come from boxing.

SWEET SCIENCE. What is it with boxing and why do we prove to be more prolific at it compared to other disciplines? Well, it’s not only in boxing actually as Hidilyn as proven.

We can be competitive in competitions where weight is the metric that levels the playing field. Consequently, if everyone is more or less of the same stature, that’s where skill and strength come into play.

Hidilyn is less than five feet tall, but is prodigiously strong and powerful. Ergo, she can excel and dominate her peers at a given weight class.

The same can be said of boxing. Even against taller counterparts, because fighters belong to a certain weight class, the playing field is even as the few inches we give up in height can be offset with our power and speed.

That is also why we can never hope to be successful in international competitions when it comes to everybody’s favorite sport in the Philippines: basketball.

Sure we are already producing seven footers who can play, but at the same time, other countries are evolving their seven footers to play at the point guard position.

It’s good to fantasize about having success in basketball, but if you want to get real about achieving success in the Olympics it’s best to focus on where our strengths lie.

LAST ROUND. It’s on Nenen Orozco Navarro who celebrates her birthday this week. Cheers!