Western Visayas strikes in Palaro

DAPITAN CITY ,Philippines  – Proving without a doubt who’s the boss in the 2011 Palarong Pambansa athletics competitions, Western Visayas launched an assault on the record books at the tailend of track and field hostilities yesterday at the Jose Rizal Memorial State University Sports Complex.

Burly Bacolodnon Maika de Oro, a familiar face at the center of Palaro’s medal podium, gave herself a perfect valedictory in the annual sportfest by smashing the meet’s secondary girls discus throw record on her way to a fourth consecutive plum.

De Oro’s swansong came after her diminutive WV regionmate, barefoot-running Ilongga Joneza Mie Sustituedo, made her opponents bite the dust in her forte – the elementary girls 1,500 meter run – for gold No. 2 and meet record No. 2.

NCR produced a record-breaker in swimming in Axel Ngui as well as a seven-gold winner in Mark Joseph Rominquit while Calabarzon delivered seven-time champ Catherine Bondad as the three regions primed up for a duel to the general championship heading into the final day.

After winning the plum in shot put on her “downtime” last Tuesday, 16-year-old De Oro went to work with the discus and heaved it to an increasing distance that reached 40.25 meters on her fifth throw.

That was more than enough to obliterate both her opposition (Region IV-A’s Mariel Pagdonsolan, 30.03m and Region XI’s April Rose Guiang, 29.69m) and her own Palaro standard (36.01m set last year).

“I really expected to break the record as I’ve been working hard with that goal in mind since I was in first year,” de Oro, who actually reset the discus throw record three times in her four years as a high schooler, said in Filipino.

A veteran of the ASEAN School Games and Asian junior championships, the 5-foot-3 discus specialist competed in shot put for the first time. “I just wanted to while away time before the discus throw event and fortunately, I won,” she said.

Sustituedo, 12, stood tall after ruling the 1,500m EG for the second straight year in record fashion late Thursday. She reached the finish line in 4:53.10 – over three seconds faster than her old meet mark of 4:57.69 set in 2010 and way ahead of runners-up Johna Mayola of Region I (5:02.31) and Anjelica de Josef (5:03.53).

“I practiced hard and was consciously going for the record,” said the 4-foot-11 runner from Lambunao, Iloilo, who also rewrote the mark when she won the 800m run late Wednesday.

Region VI also found a gold mine in badminton as Bacolod’s Nikki Therese Servando, a culinary arts freshman at St. Benilde, won the girls’ secondary singles title over Region IV-A’s Janelle Gloriane De Vera, 21-13, 16-21, 21-16.

Ngui, 16, topped the boys’ 13-17 200m freestyle in a record 1:59.05, beating a similar mark-besting 1:59.20 effort by second-placer Fahad Alkhaldi of Calabarzon. Scratched off the records was Olympian Ryan Arabejo’s 1:59.92 set in 2005, the ninth record overall to fall here.

Rominquit conquered the boys’ 6-12 50-m freestyle, clocking 26.71 against teammate Marco Daniel Callanta’s 28.03 and Region IVA bet Joshua Casino’s 28.29, to sweep all his seven events here.

Bondad duplicated the seven-gold feat in the distaff side, checking in at 29.76 versus teammate Nicole Meah Pamintuan (30.32) and NCR’s Shane Chantal Uy (30.63) in her final event.

The Big City bets also struck hard in gymnastics over at the Polanco Municipal Gym.

NCR’s Ariell Nichole Orella (elem girls) won five golds in rhythmic gymnastiscs – rope, ball, hoop, ribbon, individual all around and team championship, along with a silver while Mary Carmeli Garrovilla achieved the same in the secondary girls side.

Central Visayas’ archer Marie Crizabelle Merto won her sixth gold of the meet in secondary girls Olympic round (108 points) but failed to complete a seven-event sweep as Region 7 settled for third in the Team Olympic Round behind NCR and Region IX.