Young gymnasts off to jittery start, land 4th

The Philippines’ quest for gold medals in the gymnastics was off to a listless start as the local gymnasts landed fourth in the women’s artistic gymnastics team competition in the 23rd Southeast Asian Games.

The Philippines fell short to Malaysia for the bronze medal by only 0.866 points as the latter scored a 123.962. Singapore seized the gold medal with 128.195 points while Vietnam took the silver with 126.649 points.

"Everything was okay. They were good and really strong. But in the competition, everybody gets nervous, it’s normal to be like that," said Philippines’ foreign coach Liliana Ionita.

The country’s women artistic gymnasts, composed of Philippines’ No. 4 Kristine Raissa Saguisag, Patricia Paraso, Emille Crista Santos, Cintamoni de Guzman, and Danielle Phoebe Espiritu had some trouble in the uneven bars and the balance beam, but managed to top off their performance with good finishes in the floor exercise.

Paraso had the highest score in the Philippine contingent with 7.9 in the floor exercises while Saguisag’s 8.9 in the vault added to the team’s effort.

Singapore, however, outclassed all other countries with smooth and clean executions in all four events, averaging 32.049. Second-place Vietnam emerged strong also in the vault and floor exercise events.

Lee Wen Ling of Singapore had the highest score in the floor exercise with 8.266, Nicole Tay Xi Hui and Tabitha Tay Jia Hui shared the best score in balance beam with 8.016.

Meanwhile, Duong Minh Hang of Vietnam topped the vault with a 9.1 score.

But the Philippines registered a decent score, averaging 30.774 in the four events. Danielle Phoebe Espiritu even scored 8.183 in the uneven bars event—the only score in the event within the line of eight.

The gymnastics event resumes today with the women’s individual artistic gymnastics all-events at 10:30 a.m., followed by the men’s competition at 3:20 in the afternoon, with the Philippines gunning for the two gold medals at stake. — Reagan Tan