Tolentino: SEAG battle began on drawing board

MANILA, Philippines — Philippine Olympic Committee president Abraham Tolentino walked around during the 30th Southeast Asian Games carrying the blueprint to the successful Philippine campaign.

Tolentino said while credit belongs to the 1,084 Filipino athletes, those who won medals and those who tried, and their coaches, it all began with a well-studied battle plan.

“It took us one year to prepare, study and implement the plan,” Tolentino told The STAR yesterday as Team Philippines secured the overall title in the 30th edition of the 11-nation biennial event.

The POC chief said he sat down with each NSA (national sports association) that fielded athletes in the record 56 sports and 530 events, and tried to determine which events should and should not be included.

“The number of events surpassed 600. But based on the studies that I made that would have been disadvantageous to us. Mapupunta lang sa ibang bansa yung ibang gold,” said the lawmaker from Tagaytay City.

“There were NSAs that batted for more events when I felt they had limited chances. May NSA na from 15 events or so we trimmed it down to eight. We plotted things by using records and statistics,” said Tolentino.

“I sat down with the president, coaches and secretary-general of these NSAs twice. It took us months to finish. The NSAs said they can win as many as 220 gold medals,” he said.

“But I knew that was not going to happen. I made my own study and said on record that we can win 120 to 130 gold medals,” the POC chief said.

The plan worked.

With 135 gold, 101 silver and 105 bronze medals and a day of competition left in this year’s edition, the Philippines has eclipsed its medal haul of 112-85-93 in winning the overall title as host in 2005.

As of last night, Thailand and Vietnam were 56 gold medals behind the host country while Indonesia lay 66 golds off.

The SEA Games battle was won on the playing field and the drawing board.