Dragonboat rowers' fast mark too good to be true

MANILA, Philippines - The members of the RP dragonboat teams are being questioned for being too good, too fast in yesterday’s trials.

The men’s and women’s dragonboat teams, hoping to catch the last bus to next month’s Asian Games in Guangzhou, yesterday passed the performance trials set by the Philippine Olympic Committee.

They passed the test with flying colors at the La Mesa Dam. Not only that, they surpassed the winning times in the 2008 Asian Championships in Penang, Malaysia.

The POC wanted the RP paddlers to justify their inclusion to the Asian Games lineup. And all the POC wanted was for them to come close to at least the bronze medal standard in Penang.

But in the men’s side, made up of 22 members, the team needing only to come close to the 200m standard of 47.74 seconds yesterday posted 41.88 seconds, beating Indonesia’s winning time of 42.15 seconds in Penang.

In the 500m trial, they did one 1:47.00 to surpass Indonesia’s 1:49.79 (gold), China’s 1:50.10 (silver) and the Philippines’ own 1:55.70 (bronze) in the 2008 Asian Championships.

In the 1000m, they chopped off more than two minutes from their bronze medal effort in Penang, from 5:28.00 to 4:08.00.

The RP women’s team was just as incredible yesterday, posting 46.85 in the 200m to surpass China’s winning time of 47.68 two years ago, and clocking 1:58.38 in the 500m, again beating China’s 2008 time of 2:06.77.

The POC set a standard of 49.07 for the 200m and 2:06.85 for the 500m for the women paddlers.

Members of the monitoring team composed of officials from the POC and the Philippine Sports Commission couldn’t believe their eyes, and withheld any decision whether or not to include the teams to the Asian Games.

“We’re awaiting the report of the monitoring committee and based on that report we’ll make a recommendation to the POC board, which will convene on Friday,” said RP team chef-de-mission Jose Romasanta.

The head coach of the dragonboat teams, Nestor Ilagan, also couldn’t believe his ears when members of the monitoring team questioned the performance of the Pinoy athletes yesterday.

“Now that we met their standards, they are saying that our times were ‘improbable.’ We were very careful in checking the distance and the boats that we used,” said Ilagan.

“Everything we used were based on the standards. Even the venue that was used was the venue of the 2005 SEA Games,” he said, adding that there was no way they could have tampered with the results.