Filipino triathletes best SEA bets

GUANGZHOU, China – Nineteen-year-old Nikko Bryan Huelgas and teammate Neil Catiil finished in the top 15 in triathlon where Japan came away with a 1-2 finish but they emerged the best-performing Southeast Asian bets in the men’s side of competition yesterday.

Huelgas, a La Salle swimmer who is only on his second year in the sport, finished the 1.5K swim, 40K bike and 10K run in two hours, one minute, 53.01 seconds for 11th place, over nine minutes behind the winning time of 1:52:15.56 of gold medalist Japanese Hosoda Yuichi and the 1:52:41.49 of silver medal winner Yamamoto Ryosuke.

Catiil, the third-ranked Asian in the ITU duathlon ranking last year, clocked a slower 2:05:28.9 for 14th, but he came ahead of two Malaysians – Ismail Mohd Zuhar (17th, 2:17:05.38) and Wei Kuo Hau (18th, 2:20:05.50)-the only other SEA Games best in the Asiad.

That raised hopes of a 1-2 finish for the Philippines if triathlon is included in the SEAG calendar in Bali, Indonesia next year.

Tom Carrasco, head of the triathlon association, said he had expected the outcome would be in favor of the more seasoned bets from Japan, Kazakhstan, Korea, Hong Kong and China but saw bigger chances for Huelgas, a junior triathlete already competing in the seniors, to make an impact in international competitions in the future.

“They are competitive in the running and bike phases but they have to improve in the swim phase where they must go below 20 minutes,” said Carrasco.

Huelgas was 12th overall with 20:23 in the swim leg , 1:01:03 for 11th after the bike phase and did a fast 32:07 for third in the 10K run to finish 11th.

The 26-year-old Hosoda, a triathlete since 13 and a silver medalist in this year’s World Cup, was 19:04 (fourth) in the swimleg and paced the bike and run stages with clockings of 1:00.04 and 31:25.