Philippine athletics ushered in a new era as young stars shone bright in the 33rd Southeast Asian (SEA) Games in Thailand a couple of weeks ago.
Philippine Athletics Track and Field Association (PATAFA) secretary general Jasper Tanhueco told DAILY TRIBUNE that most of their medalists in the recent SEA Games are part of the new generation who will soon become their foundation for future international competitions.
The Filipino tracksters had an impressive performance, finishing with a 5-7-19 gold-silver-bronze medal haul to emerge fourth behind host country Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia.
“We’re happy with the team’s performance. Of course, we know there’s room to do even more, but our primary goal, as I’ve said in my interviews, was to surpass our previous SEA Games results, which we achieved, marking the biggest medal haul for Philippine athletics in 42 years,” Tanhueco said.
“A significant number of our medalists are young athletes, which reflects the strong foundation and promising future of the program.”
Tanhueco said four out of their five gold medalists are athletes who are younger than 30 years old.
Naomi Cesar, a silver medalist in the 3rd Asian Youth Games, ruled the women’s 800-meter event in two minutes and 10.2 seconds to emerge as the youngest medalist for the national squad at 16 years old.
At 21 years old, Hussein Loraña dominated the men’s 800m event with a time of 1:48.80 while Hokett delos Santos secured his first SEA Games gold medal at 23 years old after winning the men’s decathlon with a total score of 6,917 points.
Meanwhile, Paris Olympics veteran John Cabang, 24, won the men’s 110m hurdles with a SEA Games record of 13.66 seconds.
Other SEA Games medalists like 26-year-old hurdler Lauren Hoffman, 21-year-old high jumper Mariel Abuan, and 26-year-old long-distance runner Yacine Guermali also made their presence felt, giving Patafa a strong sense of optimism in future international meets.
Tanhueco said the SEA Games results give them a huge morale boost heading into the 20th Asian Games in Japan from 19 September to 4 October.
After all, they need to bounce back as they won only a single gold medal in the 19th edition of the Asian Games in Hangzhou in 2023 following Ernest John Obiena’s record-breaking feat in the men’s pole vault event.