TOKYO. – Hidilyn Diaz already has an Olympic silver medal from the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro. She gets a chance to improve on that when she competes in the Tokyo Olympics women’s weightlifting competitions on Monday at the Tokyo International Forum here.
“It’s a lot of pressure,” Diaz, who is competing in her fourth Olympics, said before flying to Tokyo.
The road to the gold will not be easy. She will compete against Chinese world record holder Liao Qiuyun, the top favorite in the 55kg division.
But Julius Naranjo, Diaz’s strength and conditioning coach, said it would be unwise to sleep on the reigning Asian Games champion.
“You will see Hidilyn lift weights that you’ve never seen before. She’s on track. She’s going to put on a show,” Naranjo said.
Naranjo added that Diaz has been hitting new personal marks this late in her career, a good sign as she prepares to bolster the Philippines’ medal hopes here.
Also going for Olympic glory Monday is MargielynDidal, who holds the distinction of being a golden girl in the inaugural skateboard competitions of the Asian Games and the Southeast Asian Games.
Didal, from Cebu, wants a bigger accolade for herself and the country, and she intends to go for glory at the Ariake Sports Park as skateboarding makes its debut in the Games here.
Didal burst into instant fame following her golden performances in the 2018 Asiad in Palembang, Jakarta and in the SEA Games at home turf the following year. She is going for the gold in one of four events to be contested in skateboarding.
A big hit among young generations, skateboarding has been an essential part of street-culture in many parts of the world, and the sport has had its various international competitions.
But skateboarding competition will be something new in its Olympic pilot staging as competitors battle in a bigger, grander course.
“Kung bagasa basketball, dati half-court lang ang inilalaromo, ngayon full court na,” said Skateboard Pilipinas president Carl Sambrano.
“The duration is the same. It’s still 45 seconds but in a bigger play,” added Sambrano of the competition where participants make two runs and perform five tricks.
The Tokyo skateboarding courses are a culmination of the designs and experiences derived from several world championships and qualifying events. Each course — for “Street” and “Park” — will be considerably larger than a typical qualifying or world championship course but still small enough to allow athletes to take advantage of all obstacles during a typical run.
Didal visited the venue Sunday observing the male skateboarders in their competition.
The women’s preliminaries start at 8:30 a.m. (7:30 a.m. in Manila) with the final set at 1:30 p.m.
