Boxers explosive start saves Philippines day

KUALA LUMPUR – After the sizzling daybreak victory by marathon girl Mary Joy Tabal, the Team Philippines quest fizzled out into daylong wait for more golds and ended up with only a silver in archery Sunday in the 29th Southeast Asian Games.

Young archer Nicole Tagle stirred up fresh waves of hope as she marched into the finals of the individual recurve only to succumb to pressure and settle for the silver while bemedalled wushu warrior Daniel Parantac missed a podium finish ending up fourth in taijian.

Team Philippines also lost one of its expected golds as the Volcanoes, the 2015 champs, bowed out of the rugby sevens’ title picture and eventually blew their chance to salvage bronze, bowing to Thailand in the battle for third, 7-26.

Fancied Filipino boxers played true to form and went three-for-three on opening day, sending Ian Clark Bautista, Mario Fernandez and Eumir Felix Marcial into the medal rounds.

The Philippines, which earned one gold from Tabal’s win in the marathon Saturday morning, had the same tally of 1-1-2 gold-silver-bronze medals, a poor seventh for a contingent hoping to crash into the upper five of the 11-nation meet after a tragic sixth place in 2015.

Bautista, Marcial and Fernandez, already assured of a bronze, all advanced to the semifinals where a win puts them on the gold medal round.

The boxing team is also pinning its hopes on newcomers Marvin Tupaz and Carlo Paalam and veteran Charly Suarez who climb the ring today at the start of their respective title drive.

The Association of Boxing Alliances in the Philippines is now going all out to win six gold medals to improve on its four-gold medal output in 2015.

Tragedy befell the wushu team when its bemedalled campaigner Daniel Parantac couldn’t put in a fight worthy of a champion with a recurring knee injury that worsened in the taijijian event of wushu.

Wushu, which accounted for the first gold medals of the Philippines in the early days of the 2015 SEAG, hopes to bounce back when its wushu artists compete in four events of wushu starting at 9 a.m. today.

The Philippines’ gold medal chances today rest on triathletes where triathlon chief Tom Carrasco says his four bets – Claire Adorna and Nikko Huelgas gun for a 1-2 repeat of 2015 and Kim Mangrobang and John Chicaco hope to do the same in the men’s side.

Malaysia zoomed to the lead early with 14-1-10-9 as of press time yesterday, while neighboring country Singapore is second at 6-7-6 and defending champion Thailand at third with 4-4-4. Indonesia is at fourth (2-4-7), Vietnam at fifth (2-3-1) and Myanmar at sixth (2-1-0).

Other gold medal events where the Philippines is in contention are the men’s and women’s road race in cycling, gymnastics, and the men’s and women’s in the recurve team event in archery.