Sports Eye
Well-organized Dagupan duathlon
By Jesus A. Garcia Jr.
I watched the Dagupan City duathlon event last Sunday and found it a very successful affair organized by the Dagupan City Cycling Club (DCCC) with my cumpadre Manny Ugaban at the helm as the president and assisted by his comrades Dr. Butch Ydia, Jun Jabanes, my son Jazy Garcia, to name a few. Honestly, it was my first time to watch this kind of discipline in the country and I was amazed how it was ran and lured 91 contestants to the Jose de Venecia Boulevard Extension, starting and finishing inside the compound of the CSI Mall in Barangay Lucao. As I expected, two national team members, teenager Jeric Buhian and the aging Jefferson Valdez easily conquered the affair in a 1-2 fashion finish. Professionals like Engr. Rodolfo “Boy” Dion who now heads the DPWH second engineering district based in Candon City, Ilocos Sur joined the race with much gusto.
Year 1985 when I first watched a duathlon event held in Guam. Unlike the just concluded Dagupan tiff which was an individual event, the Guam duathlon was a relay event with each team made up of two athletes, a runner and a biker. My Jazy anchored the bike event while his friend Anthony Milevsky of the U.S. Air Force did the footrace. Jazy was the champion then in Guam cycling events and Milevsky was a veteran of Hawaii triathlon popularly known as Ironman. Yes, they convincingly won the event and defended their title the following year before Milevsky was transferred to Hawaii.
I also already organized an event similar to a duathlon event called “Biathlon.” Biathlon is a combined running and biking event (only) while duathon is a combination of run-bike-run and longer in distance. This was done in 1996 and 1997 in Mangaldan in conjunction with the celebration of our town fiesta that lured mostly professional and elite amateur cyclists of our province. For your info, cyclists are also good runners. Running is part of their training purposely to improve their chest breathing especially in taxing mountain stages during Tours. Hopefully the affair will be repeated. It’s a kind of sport that I like it very much. Laro ng mga macho, ‘ika nga.
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The Universities Colleges Inter Collegiate Athletic Association of Pangasinan (UCAAP) Basketball Championship officially unfolded last September 4 with Mayor Belen Fernandez gracing the occasion. Only three teams are involved and all the three are multi-titled and renowned in Pangasinan caging like the 2013 PRISAA National Games silver medalists Lyceum Northwestern University (LNU) Dukes, multi-titled University of Luzon (UL) Golden Tigers and 2011 Region 1 PRISAA champions University of Pangasinan-PHINMA (UPang) Flames. I watched the rejuvenated Dukes of Atty. Gonzalo Duque pummel mercilessly the off-formed UL Tigers. (See related story on this page) The Tigers were outran, outrebounded, outgunned and with no stifling defence as was described by Atty. Cesar Junio, a Tiger fanatic, who sat beside me during the game. “They’re not the Tigers that used to be and I guess they’re poorly trained,” Junio said, comparing Jack Vidal as a much better coach than his son Byron who is steering the Tigers this season. But what surprised me much was the Tigers’ rifleman Niko Cresencio unexpectedly missing a lot of three-point attempts (12 out of 14) unlike the previous years. He’s one of the main men of the Tigers and a perennial point contributor to Tigers’ wins. If Cresencio is off, the Tigers will most likely lose all the games. They lost the following day against UPang and now on the verge of being booted out of the finals. To remain in contention for the title, they have to win their last two matches which is a tough task but perhaps not impossible. Let’s wait and see.
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QUOTE OF THE WEEK: And God said ‘You shall not eat anything with the blood, nor shall you practice divination or soothsaying. You shall not shave around the sides of your head, nor shall you disfigure the edges of your beard. You shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor tattoo any marks on you: I am the Lord. LEVITICUS 19: 26-28
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