Bowlers bag RP’s second silver

BUSAN – The Philippines won a silver in bowling and a bronze in golf then looked forward to a gold in billiards as one cold, rainy Sunday passed by the 14th Asian Games here.

Botchok Rey , Chester King, and CJ Suarez rolled 3874 pinfalls to win the silver in the men’s trios, two days after Paeng Nepomuceno and RJ Bautista won the gold in doubles.

The men’s five-man team is in good standing heading to Monday’s finals.

Fil-Am golfer Ria Quiazon, who’s more than just a pretty face, then anchored the women’s team, which included Heidi Chua and Carmelette Villaroman, to the bronze at the Asiad Country Club.

And before the day was over, Francisco "Django" Bustamante and Antonio Lining barged into the finals of the 9-ball doubles with an 11-5 victory over Kuwait’s Khaled Al-Mutairi and Aref Al-Awadi.

Bustamante and Lining will face the winner of the semis matchup between Korea and Japan in Monday’s finals at the Dongju Gymnasium.

Reynaldo Grandea will also vie for the bronze in the 3-cushion carom singles where Efren "Bata" Reyes, the bronze medalist in 8-ball singles, bowed out.

With the bowling silver and the golf bronze, the Philippines improved its medal haul to one gold, two silver and six bronze.

The other silver was delivered by Warren Kiamco in the 9-ball individual while the other bronze medals came from rowing, bowling, billiards and shooting with two.

Quiazon was the only one among the three members of the women’s gold team who either broke or matched par with rounds of 78-72-72-77. Chua went 76-78-78-76 and Villaroman 77-76-80-80.

They took the bronze with a 603 total, just four strokes ahead of fourth placer Chinese-Taipei. Korea won the gold at 577 and Japan the silver at 579.

The members of the men’s team will have a lot to think about on their way home as they finished sixth with 909 total – 35 strokes off the winners from Chinese-Taipei.

Over at the Masam Gymnasium, featherweight Roel Laguna lost the will, strength and power to carry on and bowed out with an 18-11 loss to Thailand’s Suthisak Samaksaman.

Laguna, of Cagayan de Oro, was up on points, 11-10, entering the fourth and final round, but failed to connect the rest of the way, becoming the third casualty of Team Caltex and leaving just five members in the medal hunt.

Lightfly Violito Payla will shoot for the bronze against Nouman Karim of Pakistan while lightweight Anthony Igusquiza debuts against Syria’s Hamidi Yousef.

Except for Marvin Cordero, the rest of the Filipino archers failed to shoot straight as they lagged behind after two events in the men’s and women’s divisions.

Cordero was the best-placed RP entry in the men’s side after the action in the 70 and 90 meters where he stood in third place with 646 points. Christian Cubilla was in the 23rd at 622, Florante Matan in 41st at 590 and Arnold Rojas in 42nd at 583.

The female archers struggled in the 70 and 60 meters with Jennifer Chan running 17th at 633, Rachelle Ann Cabral in 28th at 604, Joann Tabanag in 45th at 523 and Purita Joy Marino, the individual gold medalist in last year’s Kuala Lumpur SEA Games, in 47th and last position at 325.

The RP archers will try their luck in the 30 and 50 meters Monday at the close of the preliminary round.

In baseball, the Filipinos were left stranded, not on the bases but in their dugout, after continuous rains led to the postponement of their 2 p.m. match against the Chinese.

The RP batters have lost their first three games to Japan, 0-12, South Korea, 0-10, and Chinese Taipei, 2-4. There are only five teams vying for the gold and, with the way things are going, the Filipinos might just end up watching the awarding ceremony.

In shooting, Nathaniel "Tac" Padilla and Rasheya Jasmin Luis fired blanks all the way with the former finishing 18th in the rapidfire pistol (569) and the latter finishing 17th in the 50-m rifle, three positions (569).

The gold in Rasheya’s event went to China’s Chi Du Li who booked a new Asian Games record of 685. The level of competition was sky-high that all the top eight players in the finals eclipsed the previous record.