Phl bets cop two Sanda Cup golds

MANILA, Philippines - Iloilo’s Jesse Aligaga retained his 48kg crown while Baguio City’s Jean Claude Saclag snatched the 60kg title in the seventh Sanda World Cup in Jakarta, Indonesia recently.

Foiled in his bid for a back-to-back gold medal showing in the 2013 World Wushu Championships, Aligaga made sure his quest in the World Cup would be a success as he finished off India’s Chandra Singh Mayanglamban in two rounds.

One of Wushu Federation Philippines’ silver medal winners in the 2014 Asian Games, Saclag, also a bronze medalist in last year’s worlds, scored a TKO win against Afghanistan’s Khaled Hotak Mohammad right in the first round of their showdown.

“It was a sweet revenge,” said Aligaga, who will be turning 31 next month. He mastered his last year’s World Wushu Championships nemesis, Song Bu Er of China, in the semis.

For his part, Saclag, barely in his 20s, said: “I still have a long way to go and I will continue to work hard so that I could duplicate if not surpass the achievements of my more illustrious predecessors.”

Aligaga thus joined Rene Catalan, also an Ilonggo, as the only two-time Filipino Sanda World Cup champions. Catalan was, likewise, the first Filipino to have clinched two gold medals in Wushu worlds.

Baguio City’s Benjie Rivera, the second double gold medalist who got his second gold in the 2013 Wushu worlds, also qualified for the World Cup but had retired to become a coach. The lone Filipina qualifier, Evita Zamora, on the strength of her bronze showing in the Wushu worlds, was also a no-show with an injury.

“The gold-medal performances of our only two athletes in the 2014 Sanda World Cup serve to reaffirm WFP’s enduring tradition of excellence. Their golds are the 104th and 105th in our gold-medal collection from major international competitions,” said WFP president Tan She Ling.

WFP executive director Freddie Jalasco and foreign coach Tong Qing Hai accompanied Aligaga and Saclag. The team’s trip was funded by Philippine Sports Commission with support from the Philippine Olympic Committee.