King-Rivera duo bags gold in Asian bowlfest

HONG KONG – The Philippines struck for a second straight gold medal in the 17th Asian Tenpin Bowling Championships here as the pair of Chester King and Biboy Rivera emerged the best in the men’s doubles event late Monday.

The Filipino duo combined for a total of 2571 at the end of the 12-game series held at the SCAA Bowling Center, edging out Malaysian counterparts Azidi Ameran and Ben Heng and China’s Jiang Yong and Zhang Ye.

Ameran and Heng were 12 pins short off the Filipinos and settled for the silver medal (2559) while Yong and Ye bagged the bronze medal by totaling 2500.

The win was the second successive gold medal for the country, coming in the heels of Liza del Rosario’s triumph in the women’s singles event at the start of the week-long meet featuring the best keglers from around 22 Asian countries.

The back-to-back feats put the Philippines on top of the overall standings followed by Korea and United Arab Emirates with a gold medal each.

A gold medalist in last year’s Kuala Lumpur Southeast Asian Games, Rivera scored lines of 174, 220, 267, 214, 225 and 266 for a commanding total of 1366. His aggregate of 2680 and 223 average also ranked No. 1 in the men’s all events.

Currently, No. 12 in the world and also a Kuala Lumpur SEAG medalist, King totaled 1205 on lines of 216, 206, 203, 150, 247 and 183.

The other men’s pair of CJ Suarez and RJ Bautista came in at seventh with 2453, coming 47 pins short of snatching the bronze medals.

Not as fortunate were the RP women’s team of del Rosario and Ces Yap which finished fifth in the doubles event with a 12-game series total of 2453, short of 49 pins from gold medal winners Cha Mijung and Nam Bora of Korea.

Irene Yap and team captain Jojo Canare came in at 12th place with a combine total of 2332 pinfalls.

As consolation, del Rosario is showing the way in the women’s all events, with Yap running third.