Tour of Luzon returns

By Jesus A. Garcia Jr.

IT was the year 1976 when the last Tour of Luzon was held, a multi-stage bicycle road race held annually under the intellectual property ownership of the late Atty. Geruncio Lacuesta.

A son of a fisherman named Modesto F. Bonzo from Sual won the 16-day road saga that year, capturing the title from his provincemate Samson Etrata of Binalonan.

There was a bigger race the following year, which was called Tour of Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao that ran for 17 days. This piece-maker was the overall champion, placing first in the Mindanao phase, third in the Visayas’ race won by Bolinao boy Efren Casta and second in the Luzon segment won by Benjamin Gorospe of Urdaneta. To cut the story short, we, the Pangasinan boys dominated the three-phase 1977 bicycle marathon. It was the last of my three big achievements as a professional cyclist.

After the 1977 race, the Tour of Luzon, Visayas, Mindanao was never re-staged. Two years later the Marlboro Tour was born. And the rest, as they say, is history.

After more than three decades of absence, the fabled Tour of Luzon has made a comeback under the principal sponsorship of Liquigaz. It started last Monday and will end on April 19.

I’m a little puzzled how these new organizers got the new franchise. Last I heard the new owner of this Tour is Art Valenzuela of Dagupan City. Maybe it was bought or something.

Only a few big guns among our Pangasinan riders joined the Tour this year headed by 2003 Tour Pilipinas king Arnel Quirimit of Pozorrubio and his runner-up Binalonan resident Merculio Ramos Jr., 2006 Padyak Pinoy champ Santy Barnachea, Emil Pablo from Umingan, and 2007 Padyak Pinoy runner-up Baler Ravina of Asingan.

The province’s unheralded campaigners are Mark Julius Bonzo of Sual, Edgardo Bolleser and Ryan Cantor of San Manuel and Allan Patrick Garcia of Bugallon.

Pangasinan’s internationally-skilled pedal pushers Ericson Obosa of Manaoag, Sherwin Carrera of San Fabian, Emilito Atilano of Basista, Irish Valenzuela and Renato Sembrano of Mangaldan enplaned to Malaysia on April 17 to join the 8-day Jelajah Tour of Malaysia and the 4-day Indonesia race scheduled April 30-May 3. (See related story on this page)

And like in the past, the two Baguio City stages (April 18 and 19) will be the deciding points. Those will be the stages where the men will be separated from the boys.

The Tour is doing fine except for one incident last Wednesday during the third stage. It was marred by a mix-up in a jammed stretch in San Pablo City, Laguna, 40 kilometers from the start. Many of the riders took the wrong route, which caused a pell-mell race and prompted brouhaha from the day’s leaders. But eventually the gridlock was resolved by restarting the stage using the international rule in road racing. It was the fault of the route director as well as the lead marshals. Sadly, the beautiful race was stained because the officials were remiss in their duties.

This imbroglio is not new to us. It happened to me in the 1976 Tour when we got lost in San Jose, Nueva Ecija. It also happened in a 2003 race and the verdict was always to restart the stage or declaring it a “dead lap,” as the rules say.

Anyway, as of April 16, Quirimit won the 4th stage of the Tour of Luzon.

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My congrats to the Jharrsel Builders and Construction Supply basketball quintet for winning the Mapandan Invitational Basketball Games held on April 14 at the Tulagan gym. It was an easy twin-conquest by the boys of Engr. Joey Aquino – demolishing the Pantal Dagupan City squad, 97-80, in the morning affair en route to their championship triumph, whipping the Alaminos City squad, 91-81, in the afternoon hostilities. The Mapandan five notched third place through a buzzer-beating 81-80 victory over the visiting Dagupeños.

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