5th record for NCR phenom Jomar Udtohan
STA. CRUZ, Laguna—National Capital Region track phenom Jomar Udtohan pulled off a rare sweep of his five events—all in record time—Friday to bolster his claim to the most outstanding athlete award of the 2014 Palarong Pambansa here.
The superbly fit, 5-foot-6 Udtohan, whose mother is close relative of boxing legend Gabriel “Flash” Elorde, crowned himself the sprints king of this year’s edition after winning the high school boys’ 200 meters before leading NCR to relay golds.
He tapped the rubber turf right after crossing the finish line and then posed with his teammates for photographs. He earlier ruled the century dash and the 400m.
“My father wanted me to become a boxer, but I didn’t like it,” said Udtohan, whose middle name is Elorde. “All I want is to run.”
He wasn’t the competition’s winningest athlete, though.
In archery, Mary Queen Ybañez shot through the light breeze and drizzle to top the individual Olympic round for her sixth gold.
Her pre-Palaro target was eight but she ended up losing in events where she had to shoot with her Ilocos Norte teammates.
The 16-year-old from San Fernando City, La Union, slumped in her chair and fiddled with her tablet after sharing the silvers in the Olympic round’s mixed and team events.
She earlier ruled the 30m, 40m, 50m, 60m and single Fita round. Maurice Sacho, 14, Ilustre turned in a perfect seven-of-seven feat in swimming after winning the high school boys’ 200m freestyle and leading the NCR team (with Miguel Barlisan, Eman Dapat and Alnair Guevarra) to a record clip in the 400m freestyle relay.
Ilustre, already the gold medalist in the 400m free, 200m butterfly, 800m free, 100m butterfly and 400m medley relay, and his teammates timed three minutes and 43.68 seconds, besting the old record of 3:43.83 set by another NCR quartet in 2010.
After cornering 43 of 60 golds disputed in swimming, the Big City padded its lead in the medal tally with a 70-46-38 gold-silver-bronze haul.
Calabarzon (25-32-33), Western Visayas (24-19-28), Cordillera Administrative Region (22-9-11), Northern Mindanao (19-16-21), Socsksargen (11-13-21) and Central Visayas (10-12-11) rounded out the top 7.
The 17-year-old Udtohan, who hails from Sampaloc, Manila, breezed to his third gold in the 200m with a time of 21.8 seconds, shattering the old record of 22.19 set by Ronald Calauan of Cagayan Valley in 1998.
Udtohan anchored NCR’s 4×100 relay squad that also included Venz Peña, Nesly Tersero and Jaime Immanuel Mejia to victory with a time of 43.1 seconds, 23 hundredths of a second quicker than the 43.24 old mark set by another NCR quartet in 2010.
Udtohan also anchored the same team to the 4×400 gold in 3:22.1, bettering the 21-year-old mark held by Southern Tagalog (3:23.4).
Eastern Visayas, powered by Leyte Sports Academy students, finished 1-2 in high school girls’ 200m with Leah Joan Creer and Karen Janario figuring in a dead-heat.
Creer, 16, and Janario, 12, had identical clockings of 25.8 but Creer took the gold in a photo-finish. Northern Mindanao flexed its muscles in athletics with Jie Anne Calis adding the gold in the high school girls’ 3,000m run to her gold in the 1,500m.
In ballgames, Western Visayas stunned defending champion NCR, 25-21, 25-19, to make the finals of the high school girls volleyball.
But NCR got back at WV in boys’ play with a 25-21, 25-16 semifinal win.
