HANGZHOU. – Patrick Coo clinched a bronze Sunday in Chun’an to continue the Philippines’ medal tradition in BMX racing of cycling in the Asian Games.
Coo’s bronze was the seventh for Team Philippines, coming the morning after Ernest John Obiena won an expected gold medal in the men’s pole vault event.
“I’m very happy but hurting for sure,” said Coo, 21, who scraped the upper part of his right thigh after crashing in the first moto of the 12-cyclist final. “I ripped my pants in the process but got it fixed immediately.”
Japan’s Asuma Nakai, 23, a juniors’ bronze medalist in the UCI world championships last year in Nantes (France), won the gold, followed very closely by Southeast Asian Games champion Komet Sukpraset of Thailand and Coo.
With Coo’s bronze, the Philippines finished with a medal in each of the last three Asian Games–Danny Caluag won the country’s one and only gold medal in Incheon 2014 and got the bronze in Indonesia five years ago.
Caluag, 36, was in the thick of the race but was shoved to sixth place in the final–he raced still recovering from a broken rib he sustained in training in the US.
