Bowlers snare silver in trios

BUSAN, South Korea – Bowling continued to be the main source of medals for the Philippines as its three-man team won the silver with a strong finish in the final block at the Homeplus Asiad lanes here.

Chester King, Christian Jan Suarez and Leonardo Rey Jr., pooled a solid last game to catch United Arab Emirates at second behind eventual winner Singapore.

The team of Liza del Rosario, bronze medalist Liza Clutario and Cecilia Yap, which was running second at the end of first block, lost their touch and tumbled to eighth place with 3641 aggregate in six games.

Thus the Filipino bowlers have so far accounted for three of the nine medals Team Philippines has won in the Games going into the final week in this port city.

They earlier won a gold through Paeng Nepomuceno and RJ Bautista in the doubles and the bronze of Clutario in the singles.

And they are chief contenders for a medal in the five-player event with the team showing the way after the first three-game block.

The King-Suarez-Rey team amassed a six-game total of 3874 to tie the UAE team of Hulaiman Al Hameli, Abdulla Mubarak and Mohamed Al Qubaisi at second.

Men’s singles champion Remy Ong gave Singapore its second gold in a teamup with Heng Soon Goh and Lee Yu Wen with 3961.

"It’s a good finish we really had to work hard in the last gme to overtake Korea and catch UAE," said Rey, the skipper of the team.

King recovered from a so-so first game and rolled consistently for lines of 189-233-201-229-238-215-1305; Suarez put in 248-193-223-160-174-253-1251 while Rey had 221-188-225-212-249-223-1318.

Korea ended up fourth with 3831and the Filipinos drew extra satisfaction from beating the Koreans after they felt there were deliberate moves to slow the RP keglers down with a malfunctioning pin-setter machine.

" I think they were trying to break our momentum. They did that in ladies trio at the expense of Chinese-Taipei," said Rey who dedicated the medal to wife Carissa and daughter Aika.

Del Rosario, who celebrated her 25th birthday yesterday, Yap and Clutario played below par and ended up 164 pins away from the top. Clutario tallied 587 on games of 181, 190 and 214, Del Rosario carded 577 (188-220-169) and Yap 573 (180-195-198).

The other RP squad composed of Irene Garcia-Benitez, rookie Kathlynn Ann Lopez and Jojo Canare checked in 15th and second to last at 3291.

Korea’s Cha Mijung, Kim Sookyung and Kim Yeau Jin rallied in the sixth game to overtake Chinese-Taipei’s Huang Chung Yao, Wang Yi Fen and Wang Yu Ling and take the trio’s gold with 3805, nine pins ahead of the Taiwanese.

Malaysia’s Shalin Zulkifli, Sarah Yap and Wendy Chai took the bronze at 3720.

"Hindi makita ang linya, they were trying too hard and couldn’t adjust to the lanes," said Steve Hontiveros, president of the Philippine Bowling Congress.

In the five-player event, Biboy Rivera, Rey, Paeng Nepomuceno, RJ Bautista and King combined for 3177 after three games Saturday night to lead Japan by 16 and China by 65. The final 3-game block will be played today.

"Okay naman at nasa taas tayo pero maliit lang ang laman natin and we really have to bowl very well to maintain that lead," said Nepomuceno.