PHNOM PENH—Two gold medals are ready for the picking for Team Philippines in Obstacle Racing but host Cambodia looked bent at breaking Filipinos’ domination in triathlon at the 32nd Southeast Asian Games.
Cambodia, meanwhile, officially welcomed the members of Team Philippines in formal rites on Wednesday morning at the grounds of the 60,000-seat Morodok Techo Stadium.
“Hopefully, this goes on and on,” said Pilipinas Obstacle Sports Federation (POSF) president Atty. Al Agra, whose wards are guaranteed of gold medals in both men and women categories of Obstacle Racing.
Precious Cabuya was unstoppable at the OCC Wedding Center as she covered the 100-meter course in 33.1278 seconds with compatriot Kaizen de la Serna coming in second to seal an all-Filipina duel for the women’s gold medal.
De la Serna, who owned the erstwhile world record of 35.42 seconds, clocked a personal-best 34.8634 in the initial runs to set up the final duel with Cabuya on Saturday.
The men’s contest was no different at all.
Mark Julius Rodelas shattered his own world record of 26.42 seconds with 25.0921 seconds in the heats to arrange a gold medal-showdown with 2019 SEA Games champion Kevin Pascua.
Pascua ranked second with a new personal best of 26.1896.
The obstacle racers again are proving to be a gold mine for Team Philippines—whose participation is backed by the PSC and POC—just like in 2019 at home where they swept all six gold medals at stake.
Host Cambodia, meanwhile, sprung as the biggest threat to the Philippines’s reign in triathlon with two naturalized French standouts who could potentially shatter the campaigns of defending champions Kim Mangrobang and Fernando Casares.
Margot Garabedian, who competed for France at the 2014 World Junior Championships, leads the host’s bid in women’s triathlon and aquathlon while Mickael Chaumond will race in men’s duathlon.
Mangrobang, 31, is seeking a fourth straight women’s crown while Filipino-Spanish Casares is after back-to-back men’s crown.
The Philippines dominated the sport since its inception in the Games program in 2015 in Singapore. Filipino triathletes won three gold, one silver and a bronze in Vietnam last year.
“We are hoping to repeat our dominance, but we expect stiffer competition from all, also especially Singapore which have very good swimmers (for aquathlon),’’ Triathlon Association of the Philippines president Tom Carrasco said.
The Filipinos will also try their luck in men’s and women’s duathlon apart from aquathlon where three gold medals are at stake in the men’s, women’s and mixed team relay events.
Raven Alcoseba and Heart Quiambao will represent the Philippines in the women’s aquathlon on May 6 at the seaside town of Kep, a more than three-hour drive from the capital.
Kim Remolino and Josh Ramos are competing in the men’s aquathlon.
The aquathlon sprint is a 500-meter swim and 2.5-km run race, duathlon a 5-km run, 20-km bike and 2.5-km run event and triathlon covers 750 meters of swimming, 20 kms of biking and 5 kms of running.
“I’m still confident, we’re targeting three (gold) medals, four if we are lucky,’’ Carrasco said.