LONDON – Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) president Jose Cojuangco Jr. admitted yesterday that as a whole, Filipino athletes vying for honors in international competitions like the Olympics are undertrained and said he will address this concern when the delegation returns home from the Summer Games here.
“I think we’re not putting enough emphasis on nutrition and conditioning, both physical and mental,” said Cojuangco. “My concept is to set up three training hubs in Clark in the future. For the time being, we could build up our training center in Baguio. With sponsors like Danding Cojuangco, Manny V. Pangilinan, Milo and others, we can pool our resources to get this plan moving. We recently brought in a conditioning expert and former wrestling champion Carlos Sumulong, who’s based near San Francisco, to talk about the importance of fitness. He spoke about a maximum of seven percent of body fat for athletes. I don’t know if our athletes take vitamins or if they do, what kind of vitamins? We’re hoping to bring experts like Sumulong and his wife, who was also a champion athlete, to lecture on conditioning and fitness so that our coaches learn how to address the issue of undertraining.”
Cojuangco said he’s not downgrading the chances of the country’s 11 athletes here. “I’m optimistic,” he went on. “Just to qualify for the Olympics, they’re already winners. They all earned their tickets to the Olympics.”
POC secretary-general Steve Hontiveros hesitated to rank the athletes in terms of probabilities of bagging a medal. “Everyone will be out there fighting to win a medal,” he said. “It wouldn’t be fair to rate which athlete has the best chance and which athlete has the worst. We’re hoping for the best in all the sports we’re participating in. The athletes are prepared. I think this is a wake-up call because I expected more athletes to qualify. After four years, I’m hoping our delegation will be bigger in Rio de Janeiro even if it’s getting harder and harder to qualify.”
A former world bowling federation president, Hontiveros said it doesn’t look like the sport will make it into the Olympic program at least for the next 10 years. “It was a demonstration sport in 1988 when Arianne Cerdeña won the gold but in 1996, I was surprised it wasn’t included as a demonstration sport in Atlanta even if bowling is a US invention,” he said. “I suggested to play bowling in doubles and singles at the Olympics. We could make it TV friendly because the stepladder system is exciting. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get the votes to include it in the Olympic calendar.”
The country’s representative to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Frank Elizalde said he’s looking forward to a strong showing from lightflyweight boxer Mark Anthony Barriga. “In Beijing, we brought in Harry Tañamor but he was too cautious and couldn’t even beat an unranked Ghanaian in the first round,” he recalled. “As an IOC observer, I arranged to be assigned to boxing but after Harry’s loss, I was very disappointed. I was originally scheduled to award the gold medal to the lightflyweight champion but I was reassigned to the bantamweight division where a Mongolian won.”
Elizalde, 79, has been busy attending closed-door IOC meetings here. He’s on his last year as an IOC member. After retirement, he will become an honorary member and attend IOC meetings in the back row instead of the first.
“AIBA president Dr. Wu Chung Kuo is bringing in pros to the Olympics and challenging guys like Bob Arum,” said Elizalde. “He’s enticing fighters to stay with AIBA by introducing pro competitions with boxers not losing their eligibility to fight in the Olympics. That concept may have to be rethought.”