Pamaybay strikes gold in Southeast Asian Karate Federation tilt

MANILA, Philippines — Filipino national champion AZ Pamaybay overwhelmed Vietnamese Phe Ngoc Thanh, 9-3, to deliver the country’s lone gold medal in the 12th Southeast Asian Karate Federation Championships in Brunei Darussalam on Thursday.

The triumph in the cadet kumite male -57-kilogram division by the eighth-grader from the University of Mindanao Tagum College in Davao del Norte ensured the country that it wouldn’t go home without a single gold.

Pamaybay, who topped the same class in the 6th Karate Pilipinas National Championships in Tagaytay last March, capped what had been a dominating performance that included emphatic wins over Indonesia’s Divaine Bagus Sudiro, 8-0, in the round-of-16, Brunei’s Awangku Hasimuddin, 3-0, in the quarters and Vietnam’s Nguyen Than Phu, 4-1, in the semis.

Apart from that golden effort, the country raked in one silver courtesy of Alexis Nicole Villacarlos in the junior female -66kg section and 11 bronzes from Aleyah Magrata (+61kg), Bem Natividad (-57kg), Archail Monton (-70kg), Johnzen David Resngit (+70kg), Kelly Alexandrei Trocio (-53kg), Bernardo Fresco III (-55kg), Leonilo Banes III (-61kg), Abdulhakim Abdulkarim (-76kg), Richilieu Felipe (-84kg), Rebecca Cyril Torres (senior kata) and Christopher John Cagandahan (+84kg).