ONLY four locally-based athletes will leave for the Tokyo Olympic Games set to start on July 23, with the rest of the country’s standard-bearers coming from different parts of the world, according to Philippine Olympic Committee President Rep. Abraham “Bambol” Tolentino.
“We will have shooter Jayson Valdez, taekwondo jin Kurt Ryan Barbosa, weightlifter Elreen Ann Ando and rower Cris Nievares,” Tolentino said yesterday during an online press conference announcing Asics as the official outfitter of the national contingent.
Also joining the meeting were POC secretary general Atty. Ed Gastanes, football chief and national Olympic team chief of mission Mariano Araneta Jr. and Kabir and Anil Buxani, representatives of Sonak Trading, the exclusive distributor of Asics in the country.
Araneta said a six-man advance party that he will lead will leave for Tokyo on July 14 after a four-day quarantine starting this Sunday at the Sofitel Hotel.
All four athletes will also be quarantined at the hotel, according to Araneta.
Nievares will be the first to leave the country since his event, the men’s singles sculls, will have its heats on opening day itself, followed by while Barbosa and Valdes, whose events will be on July 24 and July 25, respectively.
Ando will be the last Manila-based athlete to leave since her event, the women’s 64-kilogram class, will be on July 27.
The other 15 Olympic-bound athletes are winding up their respective training overseas, with Carlos Yulo and judoka Kiyomi Watanabe already in Tokyo, pole vaulter Ernest John Obiena in Europe, weightlifter Hidylin Diaz in Malaysia and boxers Carlo Paalam, Nesthy Petecio and Irish Magno in Thailand.
Heading straight from the US to the Japanese capital are swimmer Remedy Rule, sprinter Kristina Knott, skateboarder Margielyn Arda Didal and boxer Felix Eumir Marcial while swimmer Luke Gebbie will come from Australia.
