Philippine Athletes in the Beijing Olympics 2008

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Archery

Event: Men's Individual

Mark Havier

Mark Pinili Javier (born October 20, 1981) is a professional archer from the Philippines. He competed in Archery at the 2006 Asian Games in Doha, Qatar but was defeated by the Korean Im Dong Hyun 113-104 in the 1/16 Elimination Round. During the 2006 Asian Games he landed 9th place in the individual category.

He is an alumnus from Silliman University, with a degree in Bachelor of Science in Information Technology. He is also a member of the Silliman University Dumaguete Archery Club (SUDAC) and the National Archery Association of the Philippines (NAAP). He has participated in several local and national competitions, earning him many medals, and has also participated in international competitions.

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Athletics

Event: Men's long jump

Henry Dagmil

AGE: 26 years old
SPORT: Men’s long jump
OLYMPIC EXPERIENCE: 1st-time Olympian
Southeast Asian Games record holder

WITH just a month left before the 2008 Beijing Olympics, long-jump specialist Henry Dagmil was hoping to improve on his leap.

But in doing so, he suffered a setback: a groin injury.

Like the grizzled warrior that he is, Dagmil brushed off the mishap and with the Olympics—the highest level of participation an athlete can reach—at hand, he was resolute in declaring his availability for Beijing.

“I’m feeling a lot better now. I’m ready for the Olympics,” Dagmil said, referring to the injury that he sustained while competing in a tournament held recently in Kuala Lumpur.

“I just felt that the injured area was overstretched. It’s really not that painful.”

This isn’t the kind of impediment that will frustrate Dagmil as he fulfills his Olympic dream. From a farm boy growing up in a sleepy town in South Cotobato province, Dagmil’s career shot up to prominence as a varsity athlete who starred for Mapua Institute in the National Collegiate Athletic Association then later on as an elite athlete and a regular fixture on various national squads.

Dagmil’s most notable feat came last year after he broke the Southeast Asian Games (SEAG) record in long jump after he cleared a distance of 7.87 meters in the Thailand Games. The SEAG mark he previously broke? It belonged to Dagmil too, a distance of 7.83 he covered in the 2005 SEAG in Manila.

Now, it looks like Dagmil is ripe and ready for the biggest stage. The world.

Event: Women's long jump

Marestella Torres

Marestella Torres (born 20 February 1981) is a Filipino long jumper.

She won the bronze medal at the 2002 Asian Championships, finished fourth at the 2002 Asian Championships and won the 2005 Asian Championships.^[1] She also competed at the 2005 World Championships without reaching the final.

Her personal best jump is 6.63 metres, achieved at the 2005 Asian Championships in Incheon.

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Boxing

Event: Light Flyweight(-48 kg)

Harry Tañamor

Fierce is the last word that would come to mind when you meet the country’s lone boxer at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Although the 30-year old Zamboangueño, exudes humility and gentleness, Harry Tañamor becomes the master of the four-cornered boxing ring during matches.

Being the 5th of nine siblings, Harry’s interest in boxing was sparked when he was 19 through the influence of his older brothers who were also boxers in their town. His serious training only began in 1999 when he was 21 years old. He competed in the National Open and in the Philippine National Games in Zamboanga.

This year will be Harry’s 2nd time at the summer games, having represented the country in the 2004 Olympics in Athens. He looks up to boxing greats such as Oscar dela Joya and fellow Filipino boxers, Olympic bronze medallist Roel Velasco and WBC super featherweight champion, Manny Pacquiao. “Harry enthused with pride in his voice, “Magaling at matapang talaga ang mga boxers natin. Lumalaban talaga ang mga Pinoy.” (Our Filipino boxers are really skillful and courageous. Filipinos always fight the best way they can.)

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Diving

Event: Men's 10m Platform

Rexel Ryan Fabriga

At 12 years old, he already knew what he wanted to do. It was in 1998 in the city of Davao when Rexel Ryan Fabriga was awed by the divers’ twists and turns that ended up gracefully in the water, which was played on VHS by a coach traveling to recruit young diving protégés. He made it to the top six who were chosen among 100 hopefuls in Davao. Little did the coaches know that they had recruited a young man who would eventually be the Philippine bet in platform diving at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Beyond the awe, Ryan knew that diving would be his ticket to helping his family and providing them a more comfortable life. Today at 22, Ryan looks back at how he forced his parents to let him go to Manila to train as a diver and he looks back without a single regret at all. “Pangarap ko talaga, kahit noon pa na iahon yung family ko,” (It has always been my dream to be able to help my family) said the Olympic diver.

Event: Women's 3m Springboard

Sheila Mae Perez

Sheila Mae Perez, born in 1986, is a Filipina Olympic diver. Reuters describes her as "one of the best divers in southeast Asia".

Perez was brought up in a poor family in Davao City. She reportedly "helped her poverty-stricken parents make ends meet by diving from cargo ships to retrieve scrap metal".

She represented her country at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, finishing 32nd out of 56. She qualified to take part in the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, but was reportedly "unable to compete". She will represent the Philippines again at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

Perez won two medals at the 2003 Southeast Asian Games, and three gold medals at the 2005 Southeast Asian Games, in the 3-metre springboard, synchronised 3-metre springboard and 1-metre springboard events, becoming the first ever triple-gold medallist from the Philippines at the Games. She won a gold and a silver in the 2007 Southeast Asian Games, not having competed in the synchronised event due to her partner Cecile Dominios having retired.

In 2006, her life story was dramatised in an episode of Maalaala Mo Kaya.

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Shooting

Event: Men's Trap

Eric Ang


GE: 37 years old
SPORT: Shooting, men’s trap
OLYMPIC EXPERIENCE: 1st-time Olympian
MEDALS: Bronze medalist, Southeast Asian Games 2005 and ’07
Three-time participant, Asian Games 1998, ’02 and ’06

ONE of Eric Ang’s closest buddies surely knows a lot about the sport of shooting. And in terms of Olympic participation and the expectations of it, Ang’s friend is somebody who’s soaked up on the rare experience, somebody who Ang, the lone RP shooter in the China Olympiad, can talk to about the possibilities in Beijing.

“I’ve been friends with Jethro I think since I started shooting,” Ang said, referring to Jethro Dionisio the country’s Olympic shooter in the 2002 Athens Games.

“All he says to me is to just have fun and do my best. He’s helped me with some of my techniques, what needs to be done to come up with a good finish. And I’ve been listening to him and hopefully things work out well for me,” he added.

Ang, like his sport, hasn’t enjoyed mainstream attention but RP shooters have been delivering the goods in international competition and for a time, on the Olympic stage.

Since 1932, the country failed to send a shooter to the Olympics only once (in 1988).

Filipino shooters used to participate in the Olympics in bunches, a batch of seven or eight of them competing in one Olympiad (the most being nine in the 1964 Tokyo Games).

Martin Gison, a versatile shooter who was adept with the pistol and the rifle, owns the record for the most Olympic participations by a Filipino (with five). In the 1936 Berlin Games, Gison, then 22 years old, finished fourth in the men’s 50m prone-position small-bore rifle event, one of the closest Filipino shooters have been to winning a medal.

The number of RP Olympic shooters has fallen drastically since that era but because it is a sport that doesn’t expose the Filipino’s normally small physique (that’s proven to be disadvantageous in other sports), shooting can be considered a potential source of Olympic gold.

“[Winning] the gold medal is very possible,” Ang, 37, said. “I’ve always been waiting for this opportunity. For me, the gold medal in Beijing is just within reach.”

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Swimming

Event: Men's 50m Freestyle

Daniel Coakley

This Filipino-American Olympian has his share of tough international competitions of his swimming career, but with pride.

In 2006 Southeast Asian (SEA) Games in Doha, Qatar, Daniel broke the record of the 50-meter freestyle event in a sweeping 22 minutes and 90 seconds time for Team Philippines, besting other Asian athletes.

Daniel also competed in the First Fina World Youth Championship in 2006 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

The 18-year-old Daniel said he would not be in this level of his career without his father, Jeffrey Coakley. He said his dad, who had no experience in swimming and coaching, has been his coach and trainer for the past 10 years.

Daniel lives in Kohala, Hawaii. He said he loves swimming because he likes the feel of the water over his head and the competition itself.

For the coming 2008 Beijing Olympics, Daniel has been training in Florida, USA under coach Sergio Lopez (Spain) and assistant coach Jason Canaloy (Philippines) since January of this year.

He said his training in the US “is intense,” adding that he does things he never did before like weightlifting.

“Practice is like a race,” Daniel said.

Event: Men's 1500m Freestyle

Ryan Paolo Arabejo

Ryan Paolo Arabejo (born October 30, 1989^[1])is a swimmer from the Philippines. He represented the country in the 2008 Summer Olympics.

Event: Men's 200m Breaststroke & Men's 200m Individual Medley

Miguel Molina

AGE: 23 years old
SPORT: Men’s 200m breaststroke, 200m Individual Medley
OLYMPIC EXPERIENCE: Two-time Olympian
MEDALS: Best Male Athlete, 2007 Southeast Asian Games
Philippine record-holder, 100m freestyle, 50m and 200m butterfly, and 200m and 400m Individual Medley

IT could very well be the end of the Miguel Molina era in swimming.

But before the best Filipino swimmer of the decade retires his goggles, Molina wants to put an emphatic stamp to a storied career that has aquatics aficionados calling him the most prolific RP tanker since Eric Buhain.

“I think [this Olympics] will be pretty exciting,” Molina, 23, confessed.

Hasn’t his national-team career, spanning seven years since he was recruited by the Philippine Amateur Swimming Association in 2001, been?

In his first foray as part of Team Philippines, Molina was part of the relay team that took the bronze medal in the 2001 Kuala Lumpur Southeast Asian Games.

In 2002, RP swimming officially found a new savior in Molina after he won seven gold medals to dominate the Southeast Asian age-group competitions in Thailand. In the Asian Games in Korea, Molina made it through the finals of the 200m freestyle, and the 200m and 400m individual medley.

Event: Men's 200m Butterfly

JB Walsh

James Bernard Walsh is a swimmer from the Philippines. He represented the country in the 2004 and 2008 Summer Olympics.

Event: Women's 50m Freestyle & Womens 100m Freestyle

Christel Simms

Joan Christel Simms is a 17-year-old high school swimmer from 'Ewa Beach, Hawaii. She will represent the Republic of the Philippines at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing in the sport of swimming for the 100-meter freestyle event.

Simms passed the Olympic qualifying standard for the 100-meter freestyle swimming event at 57.17 seconds on August 8, 2007 at the USA Junior National Swimming Championships at Indianapolis. So far, Simms has broken 54 individual Hawaii State records since she was 9 years old. Simms became a member of the USA National Junior Swimming Team in 2007.

She recorded a 57.12-second time for the 100-meter freestyle heat and 26.38-second time for the 50-meter freestyle -- both passing the USA Olympic trial cut.

Simms will be the seventh female representative in the entire history of the Republic of the Philippines to compete in the Olympics, since the country first participated in the Paris 1924 games.

Throughout her swimming career, Simms has continued to play a leadership role among Hawaii swimmers. One of her most notable achievements include consecutively placing high among the annual, nationwide USA Swimming “Top 16 Age Group” ranking since the age of 12. A few of her most notable sport highlights include: making the USA National Junior Swimming Team at 16 years old, qualifying for the Olympics, being a 10-time Hawaii State Champion, a 4-time recipient of the Governor Linda Lingle Most Outstanding Female Swimmer Award, breaking a Western zone record in the 200-meter freestyle event at 13 years old, and having broken 54 state records (not including relays) to date.

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Taekwondo

Event: Men's 58kg

Tshomlee Go

27-year old Taekwondo Jin, Tshomlee Go is one of the country’s best bets for the first-ever, much coveted Olympic gold. Getting to the Olympics wasn’t one of Tshomlee’s goals at first, but his natural talent made him worthy to take part in the world’s most prestigious sporting event. The 2008 Beijing Olympics will be Tshomlee’s second trip to the Olympics, having competed in Athens in 2004.

Taekwondo goes beyond being a sport to Tshomlee, it’s actually a family thing. His father and two brothers used to be members of the Philippine National Taekwondo team. And at the age of seven, Tshomlee’s love for Taekwondo began.

Although his interest started when he was young, his strong desire to compete began the moment he saw his older brother on television competing at the 1999 Southeast Asian (SEA) Games in Brunei.

Fueled by his desire, discipline, dedication and love for the sport, Tshomlee sparred his way to a winning streak. “Importante talagang mahal mo yung sport pati yung full commitment ng athlete.” (Love for your sport is very important as well as the athletes’s full commitment to it.)

Tshomlee, along with fellow Taekwondo Jin and Olympian, Toni Rivero, trains twice a day from Monday to Friday. Tshomlee says he sacrifices a lot to train, but everything is worth it. “Walang time masyado para sa gimik at konti lang para sa pahinga pero kailangan talaga yung training.” (There’s not much time for going out and little time for rest, but training is really essential.)

Other than sparring training, Tshomlee puts gravity on mental preparation for an excellent performance in this year’s Olympics. He is more optimistic about his second trip to the games this August. “Mas mature na yung laro ko ngayon. Alam ko na yung diskarte ko.” (My game is more mature now compared to before. I already have a strategy in mind.) He adds, “I’m more excited about the Olympics this time since I’m already familiar with the flow.”

Event: Women's 67kg

Mary Antoinette Rivero

She was just four years old, watching her two older brothers in the sidelines while they did their ‘poomsae’ (or forms) and sparring during their Taekwondo training. Today at 20, Mary Antoinette Rivero or Toni as she is called, is no longer a mere spectator. She is now at the center of all the action. All eyes will be on Toni at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, her second stint at the most-awaited Summer Games, having participated as the youngest competitor in Athens last 2004.

Toni is determined to do the best she can in the upcoming Olympics. “This year, being my second time at the Olympic games, I plan to surpass what I reached in Athens and to do this, it’s important to be positive, determined, focused and patient.” Toni made it into the finals in the 2004 Olympic games when she was just 16 years old.

The 5 foot 8 Olympian has conditioned her mind into winning. “One of the best attitudes of Filipino athletes that I’ve observed is the fact that we won’t leave without putting up a good fight. Filipinos are also known for being brave and driven with an unmatched fighting spirit.”

Toni’s positive disposition most probably comes from the unwavering support she gets from her family. She adds, “Knowing that my parents and family support me is really a big factor in my performance.”

Athleticism definitely runs in the Rivero family. Toni’s mom and dad were both into martial arts while her two older brothers are national Taekwondo team members as well. “I love Taekwondo especially with my family’s influence. If my sport wasn’t Taekwondo, I’d still stick with martial arts,” said Toni with conviction.

Having siblings who are also part of the national team proved to be an advantage for Toni. “My brothers share their techniques and help me in my training.” The normal training schedule for Toni consists of three sparring trainings per day, one in the morning, one before lunch and one at night. She also lifts weights and runs for added strength and agility.

The support of the Filipino people is an added motivation for our athletes as attested by Toni. During the Manila SEA Games in 2005, Toni felt the added boost when she felt the support from her countrymen. “Iba pag nagko-compete ka sa home country mo, hindi lang yung athletes yung sumusuporta, pati yung Filipino people,” she enthused in the vernacular. “It’s really different when you have everybody’s support.”

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Weightlifting

Event: Women's 58kg

Heidilyn Diaz

AGE: 17 years old
SPORT: Women’s weightlifting, 58kilogram category
OLYMPIC EXPERIENCE: 1st-time Olympian
1st RP Olympic weightlifter since 1988
Youngest RP athlete in Beijing

JUST last March, Heidilyn Diaz reached a milestone in her life. She walked up the stage with her batchmates to celebrate their high-school graduation.

In August, Diaz will march with the rest of the world to celebrate the Greatest Show on Earth.

A segment out of the Wish Ko Lang TV program for the 17-year-old lass from Zamboanga City, isn’t it?

“Every athlete has been dreaming of making it to the Olympics,” Diaz, the country’s lone Olympic weightlifter, said. “I am just lucky enough to achieve it at this very young age.”

Diaz’s regimen, considered not the usual kind girls her age take, proves hard work, not luck, thrust her into the Olympic limelight—a regimen that includes regular visits to the gym and, yes, lifting massive weights.

The Olympic dream was always in Diaz’s mind, but the original projection was getting to the London Games in 2012. It’s just that Diaz’s learning curve has become so steep she couldn’t be denied a ticket in Beijing.

Starting out in the Universidad de Zamboanga and in the Batang Pinoy national youth games, Diaz blossomed into a real force that had the national team noticing. She made it to the Asian Games in Doha in 2006 and then in the Southeast Asian Games last December in Thailand where she secured third place in the 58kg category.

Diaz’s mark of 80kg in the snatch and 100kg in the clean and jerk category in the her weight division are Philippine records.

The national federation took note of Diaz’s progress and potential that when a chance at fielding an Olympic wild card came up, the Philippine Weightlifting Association didn’t hesitate to list down Diaz’s name as a candidate.

While she is giddy about the opportunity, Diaz is realistic about her chances.

“Honestly, winning the medal is not going to be easy for somebody like me. But who knows, things might get better,” Diaz, currently a computer-science freshman, admitted. “Like other sports, weightlifting is unpredictable. So my goal now is to improve my game.”

Diaz admitted that she felt nervous when she found out she was going to the Olympics, but when the news had finally sunk in she realized the magnitude of the rare experience.

“I’m still young and I have all the time to prepare and improve, if not this year, maybe in the next Olympics,” she added.

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References:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippines_at_the_2008_Summer_Olympics
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Javier
• http://www.gmanews.tv/olympics2008/philippineathletes/1/henry-dagmil
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marestella_Torres
• http://www.microsoft.com/philippines/olympinoy/stories_tanamor.html
• http://www.microsoft.com/philippines/olympinoy/stories_fabriga.html
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sheila_Mae_Perez
  
• http://www.gmanews.tv/olympics2008/philippineathletes/9/eric-ang
• http://www.sunstar.com.ph/specials/olympics2008/?p=330
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryan_Paolo_Arabejo
• http://www.gmanews.tv/olympics2008/philippineathletes/8/miguel-molina
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Walsh_(swimmer)
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christel_Simms
• http://www.microsoft.com/philippines/olympinoy/stories_go.html
• http://www.microsoft.com/philippines/olympinoy/stories_rivero.html
• http://www.gmanews.tv/olympics2008/philippineathletes/7/heidilyn-diaz