Mendoza, gold medallist in last year’s Southeast Asian Fencing Federation championships in Indonesia, controlled the game over his rookie teammate, who looked spent after the eight-man round-robin eliminations that sent him to the semifinals.
"I was already pressured by the time I reached the finals, and considering I was up against a veteran I thought it would not matter much if I lost to Wally," said Velez.
Mendoza, who was not around after the match, brushed aside Colfi Rumuat of Indonesia to arrange the all-Filipino title match.
Velez, a 20-year-old third year education student at the University of the East, topped Muhamed Fairuz of Malaysia in the semifinals, making the finals a showdown for the cash incentive of P100,000 from the Philippine Sports Commission and an undisclosed additional incentive only for gold medallists from First Gentleman Mike Arroyo.
At the end of fencing competitions, the Filipinos gained one gold against four silver medals — by Velez, actor Richard Gomez (men’s epee), Lorina Ann San Diego (women’s epee) and Lenita Garcia (women’s foil) — and one bronze by Roland Canlas (men’s foil).
Indonesia and Thailand topped the fencing competitions with 2-1-1 and 2-0-5 gold-silver- bronze medals, respectively.
The fencing competitions, which were excluded in the 1999 Brunei Games, were limited this year to five individual events. Like in the 1997 SEA Games in Jakarta, the Philippines was fighting for gold in each of the five individual events.
It had a 3-7-1 in 1997, 3-2-1 in the 1995 Chiang Mai Games, and a record 6-3-4 to win the overall title in the 1993 Singapore Games. Quite ironically, the Filipinos had only 1-2-5 against the nine golds of Indonesia when Manila hosted the SEA Games in 1991.
For the record, the Philippines captured the overall championships of the SEAFF for three consecutive times and captured nine of the 10 gold medals at stake on each occasion.
"I’m happy with the output. Of course, we will strive for the gold next time," said Victor Africa, president of the Philippine Amateur Fencing Association.