PH’s Dumaan treks rough road to gold in pencak silat

Dines Dumaan of the Philippines after winning the gold medal in the men’s tanding putra class A 45-50 kg division of the 29th Southeast Asian Games pencak silat competition Tuesday at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Center in Kuala Lumpur. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO/SEA GAMES POOL

KUALA LUMPUR —Dines Dumaan went through the wringer to give the Philippines a coveted gold in pencak silat Tuesday.

And while it wasn’t enough to avert yet another failed bid by the country in the biennial meet, the gold was worth a celebration.

Dumaan, 21, needed to run off his excess weight for the tanding Class A 45-50 kilogram division but still had enough strength to defeat Indonesia’s Firman, 4-1, in the Southeast Asian Games final held at Bukit Kiara here.

READ: Lesser-known sport gives life to struggling PH SEA Games bid

A newcomer in the SEA Games, the Roxas City-native was overweight by 4.4 pounds prior to the start of competition Sunday, according to pencak silat chief Princess Jacel Kiram.

“He’s a very hardworking athlete with a lot of promise,” said Kiram of Dumaan, who won a bronze during the Asian Beach Games last year.

Dumaan was discovered from the national games, according to Kiram.

“But he worked his way up the national team after impressive sparring with national team members,” she added.

Mastafa Fitri Masjuri of Malaysia and Muhammad Ridhwan Selamat of Singapore took the bronze medals in the division.

It was the first pencak silat gold medal scored by the Philippines in the SEA Games since 2005.

Before Dumaan hit paydirt, Princesslyn Enopia, Rickrod Ortega and Jefferson Rhey Loon copped the bronzes in the women’s tanking Class A, men’s tanding Class C and Class D, respectively.

Almohaidib Abad and Cherry May Regalado were still in contention for golds in the men’s and women’s artistic divisions late Tuesday.