Four records and a dream: PH athletics on verge of milestone Paris squad

FILE PHOTO: Olympic rings to celebrate the IOC official announcement that Paris won the 2024 Olympic bid are seen in front of the Eiffel Tower at the Trocadero square in Paris, France, September 16, 2017. REUTERS/Benoit Tessier/File Photo

At the conclusion of the ICTSI Philippine Athletics Championships, four Philippine records were installed anew and at least two more Filipino track and field athletes are certain to accompany pole vaulter EJ Obiena to the 2024 Paris Olympics.

With hurdlers John Cabang Tolentino and Lauren Hoffman virtually qualified, the national athletics squad could send a maximum of seven bets to the glitzy French capital.

“They (Tolentino and Hoffman) are 90- to 95-percent in already. Then you have Eric Cray and Robyn Brown. Both of them are on the borderline, but technically they are also inside the Top 40,’’ Philippine Athletics Track and Field Association (Patafa) president Terry Capistrano told the Inquirer.

READ: Possible 25-strong PH Paris Olympics team

Joining Cray and Brown at the edge of their respective World Athletics Olympic qualification ratings is sprinter Kristina Knott, the Tokyo Olympian who is vying to clinch a second consecutive Olympic berth in the women’s 200 meters.

“The most number of athletes that we were able to send [to the Olympics] was three. This time I think we should get a minimum of four and probably five. Six is a tall order,’’ said Capistrano.

Waiting for visa

But if long jumper Janry Ubas manages to squeeze in, a record seven Filipino athletes from the sport could don the national colors in Paris.

Ubas, Southeast Asia’s long jump king, is presently ranked No. 35 out of the 32 athletes in his event that could make it to the Olympics through the ratings.

Ubas shoots for qualification points this weekend in a tournament in Japan and intends to see action in at least three more meets in Europe pending the approval of his Schengen visa.

READ: A gold in Paris means a home in Olympic Village

Tolentino shattered his own national mark in the men’s 110m hurdles during the five-day national meet while Hoffman erased her own Philippine standards in the women’s 100m and 400m hurdles.

Tolentino, a Filipino born and raised in San Sebastian, Spain, is ranked No. 24 in his event, and Hoffman stands at No. 30, both of them well inside the Top 40 qualifiers to the Summer Games.

Cray, Brown and Knott still need to either increase their ranking points or qualify outright by hitting the Olympic standard.

Cray can qualify outright by finishing 48.70 seconds or faster in his succeeding races in the men’s 400m hurdles. Knott should meet the Olympic standard of 22.57 seconds in the 200m, Brown needs to go faster than 54.85 seconds in the women’s 400m hurdles and Ubas should reach the qualification mark of 8.27 meters.

There’s another Olympic wannabe in Filipino-American Victoria Bossong, whose personal best in the women’s 800m is 2:00.92, just over a second slower than the Olympic standard of 1:59.30.

The 21-year-old neuroscience major at Harvard University will have at least three races in Europe next month to try to cover that gap.