Karate champ De los Santos survives foes in double thriller
CEBU, Philippines — Cebuano world no.1 e-karateka Orencio James “OJ” de los Santos sustained his hot streak with two more golds under his belt.
This time, he achieved it the hard way.
De los Santos literally had to pass through the eye of a needle before carting away his 20th and 21st online karate golds of the year. He now has 57 golds overall since he joined virtual tilts at the height of the global pandemic last year.
The two-time Southeast Asian (SEA) Games bronze medalist reasserted his dominance over Swiss archrival Matias Moreno-Domont by the skin of his teeth, 24.7-24.6, to reign supreme in the eKarate World Series #3.
The 30-year-old De los Santos then edged past Abdellatif Choukri of Morocco via a super close 25.32-25.28 decision to rule the Okinawa eTournament World Series #2.
De los Santos said he will use his nerve-racking wins as an added motivation to practice tougher and strive harder for his upcoming events.
“I’ll admit these two tournaments were close matches. But this makes me want to train and prepare even harder for the next tourneys to come. On to the next one!,” De los Santos wrote on his Facebook page. — EBV
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