By NICK GIONGCO
JAKARTA – It was another heartbreaker for the Philippines on Saturday as Fil-Am BMX rider Daniel Caluag could only settle for the bronze medal in his bid to win back-to-back titles in the Asian Games.
The 2014 Incheon Asiad titleholder, Caluag submitted a time of 35.842 seconds at the Pulo Mas International BMX Center, more than two seconds slower than that of Japanese gold medalist Nagasako Yoshitaku, who timed in at 33.669.
The runnerup honors went to Saputra Gusti Bagus of the host country, who checked in at 24.314.
Sienna Fines, another Fil-Am entry in the women’s side, landed fifth. Caluag’s inability to duplicate his feat in Korea came less than 24 hours after boxing found itself on the ropes early with the exodus of another gold medal bet, featherweight Nesthy Petecio, and welter Joel Bacho, at the start of the competitions Friday.
“I am happy with the medal but I would have liked a better color but any medal for the Philippines is definitely a good result especially in a world date like this,” said the 31-year-old Caluag.
Caluag was hoping that his rivals would be spent by the time they all battle in the finals but they all had the same thing in mind.
“I was hoping they would expend all their energy. They actually saved their energy just like I did,” said Caluag, who has competed in seven world championships and one Olympic Games.
Mario Fernandez makes his debut in the 56 kg (bantamweight) class late Saturday after Petecio got the short end of the stick in her battle with Chinese Yin Junhua, who carved out a 3-2 decision.
But the string of misfortunes following Hidilyn Diaz’s weightlifting gold earlier in the week could come to a screeching halt as pencak silat is at least assured of a silver with Cherry May Regalado seeing action Monday in the Seni (artistic) finals.
It was Black Friday for the Philippines as Meggie Ochoa, who had earlier been tabbed as a sure gold medalist in jiu-jitsu, finished third after getting ambushed in the quarterfinals by Thi Thanh Minh.
Ochoa followed the same route taken by gymnast Carlos Yulo, who finished seventh out of eight entries in the finals of the floor exercise Thursday.
Yulo had been baptized by his handlers as a rising star but the 18-year-old melted away under the bright lights of the Jakarta International Expo.
Not counting the pencak medal, the Philippines has a medal tally of one gold and seven bronze medals as it appears to sink deeper into the abyss unless the Filipino athletes make a turnaround in the last seven days of full competitions.
Two other jiu-jitsu medal hopefuls failed to advance during the preliminaries.
Annie Ramirez, gold medalist in the Asian Indoor last year in Turkmenistan and 2017 Asian championships top performer, was beaten by Sung Kira of Korea, 21-0, in the 62 kg.
