PH shooter way off mark

NANJING—Shooter Celdon Jude Arellano blamed poor preparation after bombing out of the 2014 Youth Olympic Games here Wednesday.

“I wasn’t able to work out the past few days so I could keep up with my opponents,” said the 16-year-old Arellano after finishing 14th in the qualifying round of the men’s 10-meter air rifle at the Fangshan Shooting Hall.

“You need to at least jog and be physically fit. Because if you’re not, your legs won’t be stable and it could affect the accuracy of your shots,” said the information technology student, who finished with 605 points after six rounds.
Arellano fired strings of 96.5, 102.2 and 99.9 in a shaky performance during the first three rounds before steadying his nerves in a focused and confident windup with scores of 102.7, 103 and 100.7.

Yang Haoran of China topped the qualification round with 629.4 points and eventually bagged the gold medal over Hrachik Babayan of Armenia after posting 209.3 points in the finals. Babayan scored 204.3 and Istvan Peni of Hungary got the bronze (183.5 points).

Despite the outcome, Arellano, who competed in the Asian YOG last year, moved up two notches from No. 16 in the world rankings for shooters 14-18 years old.

“Although his scores were not that impressive, the results were still good. He’s now 14th in the world,” said coach Julius Valdez.

Had the dusky Arellano matched his personal best of 622, Valdez said he could have easily hurdled the qualifying and contended for a podium finish.

Arellano, a protege of former junior world champion and veteran internationalist Nathaniel “Tac” Padilla, fired 611 in an ISSF world shoot in Beijing in July and registered 609.8 in another tourney in Munich two months back.

“I’m very grateful for Sir Tac’s support,” said Arellano, who used a rifle that Padilla bought for P150,000.

Out of 20 entries, Arellano  finished ahead of Turkey’s Nurullah Aksoy (605), Russia’s Sybrand Laurens  (602.6), Finland’s Cristian Friman (601.6), Argentina’s Lucas Decicilia  (599), Australia’s Sanchez Clopatofsky (594.5) and Bhutan’s Chimi Rinzin  (581.3).

“This is one sport that we should excel in. You don’t need size and height,” said chef de mission Jonne Go.

With triathlete Vicky Deldio and  swimmer Roxanne Yu also failing to land a medal, it’s now up to gymnast Ava Lorein Verdeflor, track and field’s Zion Rose Nelson and archers Luis Gabriel Moreno and Bianca Cristina Gotuaco to end the country’s medal drought.

Verdeflor figured in the finals of the all-around and uneven bars in women’s artistic gymnastics and Nelson raced in the heats of the 400m late Wednesday night. Moreno and Gotuaco will step on the archery range Friday.