THE Philippine Athletics Track and Field Association (Patafa) will set up its bubble training camp at the Athletic Bowl in Baguio City this month in preparation for next year’s Hanoi 31st Southeast Asian Games and Hangzhou 19th Asian Games.“We need this formal training camp because our athletes have not been training together since the March 2020 lockdown, so it’s almost two years now,” Patafa President Dr. Philip Ella Juico told BusinessMirror on Sunday. “We will continue monitoring our athletes abroad and develop team spirit among them.”
Patafa Marketing Communication Director Edward Kho said the association intends to open camp on October 3 to allow athletes from the provinces to adjust their schedules.
“Most athletes will be coming from the provinces and they have no flight bookings yet,” Kho said.
Kho said the camp is expected to last three months and will cost between P2 million and P3 million.
Forty athletes—including 2019 SEA Games gold winners Aries Toledo (decathlon), Clinton Bautista (hurdles), Sarah Dequinan (heptathlon) and Christine Hallasgo (women’s marathon)—will be in the camp.
The athletes will be joined by coaches Sean Guevara (head coach multi events), Dario da Rosas (head coach multi-events), Emerson Obiena (pole vault), Arniel Ferrera (discus, hammer and shot put), Danilo Fresnido (javelin), Joebert Delicano (jumps), Jeoffrey Chua (sprint hurdles), Jojo Posadas (sprints and jumps), Eduardo Buanavista (long distance), John Lozada (middle distance) and Julius Nierras (sprints).
They will be housed at the Baguio Vacation Apartment.
Foreign-based athletes—including Tokyo Olympians EJ Obiena (Italy) and Kristina Knott (US)—will continue training abroad, Juico said. The others are Eric Cray (Texas), Natalie Uy (Atlanta) and William Morrison (Indiana).
The Philippines clinched 11 gold, eight silver and eight bronze medals in athletics in the 2019 SEA Games.