'2nd overall realistic goal for Filipinos'

MANILA, Philippines - Philippine Olympic Committee chairman Monico Puentevella yesterday said it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to stop Indonesia from winning the overall title in this year’s SEA Games.

Puentevella said the Indonesians have included events, a couple of them he’d never heard of before, where they are almost unbeatable.

“While we will go out there fighting for each gold, the statistics show that it will be to the favor of the organizing country,” he told yesterday’s Scoop sa Kamayan Forum.

The president of the Philippine Weightlifting Association mentioned sports like paragliding, roller-skating, water-skiing, wall-climbing, kenpo and vovinam as being included.

Kenpo and vovinam, a couple of martial arts disciplines that are practically new to most member countries, offer 16 and 14 gold medals, respectively, and the Indonesians will definitely pounce on them.

Then there’s wall-climbing with 14, paragliding and roller-skating with 12 each and water-skiing with 11 golds at stake.

“From these events alone, there are 79 gold medals up for grabs. And I already complained about the presence of certain sports I haven’t seen in my 40 years in sports,” said Puentevella.

He said he filed a motion during the SEA Games Federation meeting in Bali four months ago that future hosts should be allowed to include only two sports outside of the Olympic and Asian Games list.

“I complained,” said Puentevella.

“In Manila, when we hosted the SEA Games in 2005, and won the overall title, we only included arnis with six gold medals, and we won only three of the golds disputed,” he said.

There will be 42 sports and more than 500 gold medals on tap in Jakarta and Palembang when the SEA Games is held Nov. 11-22.

Philippine delegation chef-de-mission Julian Camacho of wushu said last Tuesday that the mission remains the same for the Filipinos: win the overall title in Indonesia.

“It is attainable,” said Camacho, explaining that if only the Filipinos can win two gold medals in each of the 42 sports on tap then there’s a good chance for them to repeat as overall champions.

Puentevella said it’s too much to talk about winning the overall championship, considering that Thailand and Vietnam are also out to give the hosts a run for their money.

“I would like to make it clear that we will fight for the overall crown. But let’s be realistic. We should be happy if we make it to No. 2 because that means we beat Thailand. We should be very happy with that.”

Camacho countered by saying there’s nothing wrong in trying to motivate the Filipino athletes that winning the overall title is possible.

“Besides, hindi naman masama ang mag-ambisyon. Wala ring masama na mangarap, di ba?” said Camacho, adding that he can’t believe some people for being too pessimistic.

“As I have been saying, I believe in the capability of the Filipino. May kasabihan nga tayo na kaya natin ito (We can do it). And we can only do that if we provide our athletes the morale support.”