Nami Nabekura of Japan and Kiyomi Watanabe grapple during the Judo Women’s -63kg Gold Medal Match of the 2018 Asian Games at JCC Plenary Hall in Jakarta, Indonesia on Thursday. Nabekura took the gold with Watanabe winning the Philippines’ first silver medal.
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Now that Margielyn Arda Didal has won a gold medal in the 2018 Asian Games, she no longer has to worry about being chased by the police while skateboarding in the streets of Cebu City.
Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña promised to build a skating park for aspiring athletes to follow in Didal's footsteps.
In a Facebook post, Osmeña congratulated the 19-year-old Cebuana for her performance in the Games.
“Margielyn Didal of Lahug just won Gold in the (20)18 Asian Games in Indonesia. She also represented Cebu in the UK last May where she was the only competitor from Asia. Congratulations Margielyn!” he said.
“Because the awareness raised by people like you, Cebu City will be building a skate park in the SRP. My sister is personally donating P5M to your cause.”
Didal previously lamented that most skateboarders have been subjected to discrimination, as they are considered a nuisance when they skate along the roads or sidewalks.
“Nag-ii-skate kami sa Cebu sa streets lang,” she said in an interview with ABS-CBN’s Dyan Castillejo. “Hinahabol kami ng pulis ng security ‘pag may nakikitang nagiiskate.”
“Minsan 'pag nasa mall pag may hawak na skate board bawal nang pumasok.”
Osmeña said Didal will no longer worry about such things. In fact, he even invited her to help design the proposed skate park.
“As the expert, your input is of course welcome on the park’s design. Soon, people like you will finally have a place that is safe, free from traffic, and able to call your own,” he said.
Didal’s golden performance in the Games’ women’s street skate event netted her a total of windfall of P6 million in incentives from the government and private patrons.
The 19-year-old will use the bonus to make sure that parents won’t have to scrounge for money again.
“First of all gagamitin para sa family po,” said Didal. “Baka magtayo ng negosyo para sa family din. Para hindi na kelangang magwork ng mama at papa ko.”
Didal is the fourth among 5 children. Her father works as a carpenter while her mother sells street food in Lahug.
She left school after finishing Grade 7 to go through extensive training overseas. Didal had to sacrifice her studies to able to provide financial support to her family.
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Three Pinay golfers brought a pleasant surprise for Philippine sports when they pulled off a impressive performance, giving the country two gold medals in the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta on Sunday.
Yuka Saso, Bianca Pagdanganan and Lois Kaye Go clinched the team title, Saso snared the individual championship, and Pagdanganan claimed a bronze in the most productive single-day outing for the Filipinos in the quadrennial event.
Now basketball-crazy Filipino sports fans might view the trio as a product of overnight success.
But Saso, Pagdanganan and Go have been busy perfecting their golf skills for years. Their Asian Games victory was a culmination of all their efforts.
Yuka Saso
The 17-year-old Filipino-Japanese hails from San Ildefonso, Bulacan.
When she was 15, Saso led the Philippines to the World Junior Girls team title and also topped the individual standings at Mississaugua Golf and Country Club in Ontario.
Saso crowned herself as the 2018 Philippine Ladies Open champion last January. In the same month, she also claimed the 2018 Victorian Junior Masters in Australia.
Before plunging into Asian Games action, she earned her first American Junior Golf Association invitational victory at Thunderbird International Junior in the United States last June.
Bianca Pagdanganan
The 20-year-old Pagdanganan is based in Tucson, Arizona and has been active in the US circuit for years.
She competed in the Colonel Wollenberg's Ram Classic in 2016, the NCAA Albuquerque Regional in 2017, and the U.S. Women's Amateur Championship in 2018.
Pagdanganan powered University of Arizona to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) women’s championship that earned her an LPGA exemption at the Marathon Classic played last month in Ohio
Some of her biggest wins include a couple of holes-in-one at the 2017 Lady Thunderbird Invitational and the NCAA Women’s Championship last May.
The Gonzaga University golfer also claimed the championship in the 55th Philippine Ladies Open in 2017.
Lois Kaye Go
The 19-year-old Boston College junior is a native of Cebu.
In 2017, she fired a final round 65 and claimed the Women’s Porter Cup in the US. She went on to win a bronze medal in the 2017 Southeast Asian Games a few months later.
A few days before the Asian Games, Go captured the women’s title in the 13th Kuala Lumpur Amateur Open in the Kelab Golf Perkhidmatan Awam (KGPA) in Malaysia.
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Iran's Sohrab Moradi set a weightlifting world record that could last forever on Saturday as tearful North and South Korean athletes combined to win a highly symbolic medal at the Asian Games.
Olympic champion Moradi, who served a two-year doping ban from 2013, hoisted a 189 kilogram snatch en route to victory in the men's 94 kilograms class, breaking weightlifting's longest standing world record set in 1999.
Moradi's lift could stay on the record books in perpetuity as after the Games in Indonesia, all the weight classes will change beginning with November's world championships.
"I feel very happy to know that my name will always remain on all the 94 kg world records," beamed the Iranian.
Moradi's triumph for the ages came on a day when the Unified Korea team, testament to this year's marked improvement in Korean ties, won an emotional dragon boating bronze medal.
The North and South Korean athletes were in tears as they sung "Arirang", a traditional Korean folk song, to celebrate winning their medal.
Both Korean teams marched together at the opening ceremony and they have also joined forces in rowing and women's basketball at the regional Olympics.
"I was deeply emotional," said South Korean canoeist Eun Jeong-byun. "We're divided and forbidden from seeing each other but we both know the same song and speak the same language."
- Cat's amazing -
Controversy marred the start of the athletics competition when Japanese marathon winner Hiroto Inoue was accused of pushing Bahrain's Elhassan Elabbassi and denying him gold.
Both athletes had complaints rejected by race officials after they made contact during a thrilling sprint finish, which Inoue won by a fraction of a second.
"The number one (leader) pushed me," said Elabbassi. "I would have won."
Later, a cat strayed onto the track during the women's 100m hurdles heats, after China's Su Bingtian, joint holder of Asia's men's 100m record, eased into the semis.
China continued its dominance of the women's hammer, claiming both gold and silver for the fifth consecutive Asian Games -- a record stretching back to the sport's introduction.
And Daria Maslova won Kyrgyzstan's first ever track medal at the regional Olympics, storming home in the women's 10,000m with a time of 32:07.23.
In tennis, Uzbekistan's world number 75 Denis Istomin beat China's Wu Yibing in three sets to win men's singles gold -- before jumping on a plane for a 27-hour journey to the US Open in New York.
Istomin, 31, came from behind to beat the reigning US Open boys' champion 2-6, 6-2, 7-6 (7/2) in Palembang. He plays his first-round match at the season's final Grand Slam on Monday.
"I think it shows it means a lot to me and to my country. I always represent my country, never lose an opportunity," Istomin said.
World champion Kento Momota was sent crashing out of the men's badminton by Anthony Ginting as the home favorite raised the roof at the Jakarta arena.
At the end of day seven, China had extended their lead on the medals table, with 72 golds to Japan's 34 and 25 for South Korea.
About 17,000 athletes and officials are taking part in the 18th Asian Games, the biggest sports event in Indonesia's history.
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JAKARTA—Joseph Schooling did not claim to have swam a perfect race in winning Singapore's first gold medal of the 18th Asian Games but he feels the victory is another stepping stone towards the defense of his 100m butterfly title at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
The Texas-based swimmer earned Singapore's first Olympic gold medal when he won the event at the 2016 Rio Games but has since struggled with inconsistency, managing only a bronze at the world championships in Hungary last year.
Schooling said winning gold in Jakarta on Wednesday, in a Games record of 51.04, brought him "relief and joy" and hopefully signaled an end to his dip in form.
"I've been up and down over the last two years but it's part of the cycle, right? You can't always be in tip-top performance," he said at the Gelora Bung Karno Aquatic Center late on Wednesday.
"What's important is if you're not feeling at your best, step up, grind it through and try to win the race. That's what defines a champion."
The 23-year-old, who will be going for a second gold after topping Thursday's 50m butterfly heats (23.84), plans to swim in Europe before returning home for a World Cup leg in November ahead of next year's world championships in South Korea.
"I'm heading in the right direction ... I'm starting to feel more and more comfortable, so I envision the next two years getting better and better heading into Korea and Tokyo," he added.
He was happy with his time in Jakarta, which was the fifth fastest of the year and bettered his gold-winning 51.76 at the 2014 Asian Games, but felt it was "just another stepping stone" towards his ultimate goal.
"You build on it each meet, each year and you finally get to the Olympics," he said. "This is one of the building years to get to do what I want to do in Tokyo.
"Are things going according to plan? Yes, I'd say so. I'm happy with where I'm at. I'm definitely in a lot better shape than I was last year. Hopefully I can keep building on that."
And if he needs motivation, Schooling says criticism helps.
"I think criticism is good," he said.
"If everyone's on your side, praising you, it might get to your head. But I think this is a great check and balance for me.
"(I've) always proven my critics wrong. It gives me more motivation to go to practice, to race harder, so I can prove people wrong." (Editing by Peter Rutherford )
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JAKARTA—Carlos Yulo looks to reap the fruits of a comprehensive three-year training program that made him decide to leave the Philippines and call Japan his second home.
The 18-year-old eyes history, as he aims to win the Philippines’ first-ever gold medal in artistic gymnastics in the 2018 Asian Games at Jakarta International Expo Hall.
On Monday, Yulo topped the preliminary round of the floor exercises competition, giving him a berth in the medal stage on Thursday.
The final is scheduled to start at 4 p.m. (5 p.m. in Manila).
The two-time Palarong Pambasa champion has been training in Japan the past three years, a program that required Yulo to practice eight hours a day, six days a week, under coach Munehiro Kugimiya, with the assistance of the Japanese Gymnastics Federation, which is helping him to qualify for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
Yulo is one of a few elite Filipino athletes being supported by Siklab Foundation and the MVP Sports Foundation.
Yulo, who came in eighth in the men’s all-around with a score of 80.750, an event dominated by China on Monday, burst into the international scene early this year with top-3 finishes in 3 legs of the 2018 Artistic Gymnastics World Cup Series organized by the International Gymnastics Federation, the sport's world governing body.
He won a bronze medal in the vault event in Melbourne; a vault silver in Baku, Azerbaijan; and a floor silver in Doha, Qatar.
Lone Pinoy bet confident in sport-climbing
In Palembang, meanwhile, Gerard Verosil was upbeat about his chances in sport climbing at Jakabaring Sports City, a discipline that's debuting in these Games.
“Mahirap pong mag-prediksiyon. Basta confident po akong magpe-perform ng maayos dito,” said Verosil, the only Filipino entry in the field of 34.
The 17-year-old is fresh off a semifinal finish in the Asian Cup Bouldering and Speed event in Bangkok in June, which served as his tune-up for the Asian Games.
Competitors will take on a 12-meter wall during the four-day competition.
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Filipino gymnast Carlos Edriel Yulo reached the finals of the men's floor exercise and vault competitions in the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta on Monday.
Yulo, who made his Asian Games debut at Jakarta International Expo Kanayoran Hall D, garnered the highest score in the qualification round.
He scored 14.500 points, besting Chia-Hunng Tang of Chinese Taipei (14.450), and Kakeru Tanigawa of Japan (14.400).
Yulo ranked fourth in the vault event.
He collected 14.150 points behind Wai Hung Shek of Hong Kong, Le Thanh Tung of Vietnam, and Agus Prayoko of Indonesia.
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