MANILA – Ilonggo Arnel Mandal avoided a golden shutout for Team Philippines in wushu sanda competition by capturing gold in the 31st Southeast Asian Games last night at the Cầu Giấy Sporting Hall in Hanoi, Vietnam.
The Iloilo City native captured the gold medal in the men’s -56 kilogram category by defeating Indonesia’s Laksmana Pandu Pratama in the finals, 2-0.
Mandal’s win came as a breather as all the other male sanda fighters in Ilonggo Francis Solis, Gideon Padua and Clement Tabugara bowed out in the semifinals and thus finished with the bronzes.
Gymnast Carlos Edriel Yulo, meanwhile, chipped in two more gold medals to his collection. He topped the men’s men’s floor exercise and men’s rings.
Fil-Am Aleah Finnegan Cruz, for her part, captured two gold medals in the women’s artistic gymnastics all-around team and vault and a silver medal in the individual all around.
Kim Mangrobang also annexed her second gold medal on Sunday when she topped the women’s individual duathlon event. She also captured gold on Saturday in women’s individual triathlon event with teammate Raven Alcoseba finishing with bronze.
Fil-Spanish Fernando Tan Caseres, meanwhile, bagged the men’s individual triathlon gold as teammate John Leerams Chicano fell short to end up with the silver.
Agatha Wong repeated as gold medal winner in the wushu women’s taolu taijijian event after submitting a score of 9.71 points. She also had silver in the women’s taolu taijiquan event.
Ernest John Obiena, on the other hand, easily retained the pole vault gold medal with his 5.46 meters mark on late Saturday. Fellow Filipino Hockett delos Santos finished with a silver medal.
Jiu-jitsu fighters Meggie Ochoa and Annie Ramirez also notched a gold each in the women’s -48 and -62 kg, respectively, while fencer Samantha Catantan also notched gold in the women’s foil.
Kickboxers Gina Iniong-Araos and Jean Claude Saclag also secured gold medals, while Renalyn Dacquel, Gretel de Paz Cordero, Zephania Ngaya and Claudine Veloso Decena claimed silver medals.
Also ending up with silver medals were women’s 200 meter sprinter Kyla Richardson, Carlo Peña of jiu-jitsu, fencer Noelito Jose Jr. and rower Joanie Delcano.
Capturing bronze were Guimarasnon Joida Gagnao, Ilonggo Alfrence Braza, Melvin Calano and Kayla Richardson of athletics, swimmer Miranda Renner, men’s 3×3 basketball team and rowers Cris Nievarez, Edgar Ilas and Zuriel Sumintac./PN
