Pinoy rowers fall short in Olympic regatta elims

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippines’ Nestor Cordova and Johna Lyn Pedrita fell exceedingly short of securing berths to London as they both landed 13th overall in the singles sculls competitions of the recent Asian Olympic Qualification Regatta in Chungju, South Korea.

Cordova, the country’s top bet, placed third in Heat 4 in 9 minutes, 41 seconds, yielding the two spots in Semis A/B to Indian Singh Sawarn (8:00.20) and Vietnamese Nguyen Van Linh (8:29.44).

He could have still salvaged a place in the semis had he finished in the Top 2 of Repechage 1 but only finished fifth among six entries in that stage (7:57.07), thus bombing out of the race for the six-man Final A, where slots to London await.

As consolation, SEA Games champ Cordova topped Semis C/D1 in 7:26.00 and later ruled Final C (7:33.42) to end up 13th out of 20.

Pedrita, for her part, wound up sixth in Heat 1 (10:07.89) to go down to Repechage 1, where the Top 3 advanced to Semis A. She was fourth in Repechage 1 in 9:00.90, and won Final C (8:46.20) to finish 13th among 16.

“We gave up a lot to our rivals in terms of international exposure. Vietnam, for example, spent two months in Europe under their foreign coach while we’re just training here on our own at the La Mesa Dam. The disparity in preparations was obvious,” coach Ed Maerina told The STAR in Filipino yesterday.

The Korea regatta was the second to the last qualification event for rowing. The International Rowing Federation (Fisa) has set the final qualification regatta May 20-23 in Lucerne, Switzerland but it’s not clear yet whether cash-strapped Phl will be able to send a contingent there.