RP’s Canare, Suarez out of Cup elims

RIGA, Latvia — Asian Games veteran CJ (Christian Jan) Suarez sizzled with a 12-game series of 2631 and a 219.2 average, but — quite sadly — he fell two pins short of making it to the quarterfinals of the 38th AMF Bowling World Cup international finals Thursday at Toss Boulinga Halle here.

Suarez, making his second World Cup appearance in two years, completed 32 games with 7225 (225.78 average) to wind up ninth, two pins behind Finland’s Mika Luoto and five behind seventh-placer Remy Ong of Singapore, triple gold medalist in the recent Busan Asian Games.

The other Filipino campaigner, Josephine "Jojo" Canare, also came up with a remarkable 12-game series of 2589 and a 215.9 average. But she also failed to advance in the women’s division, finishing with a 32-game total of 6696 (209.25), good only for 11th place and 122 pins away from eighth-placer Teresa Piccini of Mexico.

It was the first time Canare, an Asian Gamer like Suarez, competed in the World Cup international finals after she won the Manila elimination with a perfect 300 in her final game.

Australia’s Paul Trotter, who opened his campaign here with a 300, nearly duplicated the feat in the final game of the men’s qualifying and regained the top position for yesterday’s quarterfinal round.

Trotter’s 299 closer capped a 32-game total of 7493 and edged Germany’s Kai Guenther by 54 pins despite the German’s rolling the tourney’s fourth 300 game this week.

Joining Trotter and Guenther in the quarters are England’s Wayne Greenall, third at 7359; Qatar’s Ahmed Shaheen, fourth, 7357; USA’s Andrew Cain, fifth, 7341; Saudi Arabia’s Talal Towereb, sixth, 7267; Singapore’s Ong, seventh, 7230; and Finland’s Luoto, eighth, 7227.