Para athletes haul record 10 golds

FIDE Master Sander Severino claimed two more chess gold medals in rapid play while two more mints came from cycling and swimming yesterday as the Philippines wrapped up a record 10 gold medals in the third Asian Para Games in Jakarta.

Severino added two more gold medals in rapid chess to raise his gold medal output to four. Cyclist Arthus Bucay made it nine later in the day and at the pool, Ernie Gawilan captured his third gold in the men’s 400m freestyle SC7 in 4:51.00 and set a new games record.

The day’s four-gold output hiked the Phl medal tally to 10-7-11 (gold-silver-bronze) in its best-ever showing in the quadrennial meet after finishing without a gold in the first two editions. The Jakarta contingent expected to win only a gold to better its previous performances – five silvers and five bronzes in Incheon, South Korea four years ago, with Severino and the chess squad delivering the goods.

Severino earlier thrashed FM Serik Soltanov of Kazakhstan in the seventh and final round to rule the individual rapid P1 event with 6.5 points, leading Team Phl’s solid medal sweep.

Henry Lopez and Jasper Rom took the silver and bronze with five and 4.5 points, respectively.

The troika’s feat likewise netted the Phl the team gold, capping the team’s impressive showing in the event that saw the Filipinos rake in a total of five golds, including three in the standard event last Wednesday.

Severino also won in the individual and team events while Arman Subaste, Menando Redor and Israel Peligro took the team gold in the standard B2-B3 team.

Subaste also bagged a bronze on the final day in the individual rapid B2-B3.

For sweeping all his four events, Severino is set to receive P2.66 million in government incentives, including P2M from winning two individual events and another P666,000 in team play.

Bucay topped the men’s C5 individual pursuit 4000m, besting Indonesia’s Sufyan Saori and Mahdi Mohammadi of Iran.

Gawilan, 27, annexed his third gold after he also topped the 100m backstroke S7 and 200m individual medley S7 apart from his pair of silver medals.