ON the heels of Hidylin Diaz’s golden success in the Tokyo Olympics, four young female lifters are being groomed as her heirs apparent by weightlifting chief Monico Puentevella, who said they could be medal prospects in the Paris Games in 2024.
“So now in three years’ time, I am praying and predicting that we will already have a medal in Paris since we have four girls waiting in the wings,” Puentevella, who heads the Samahang Weightlifting ng Pilipinas, said yesterday during the Philippine Sportswriters Association online forum.
Puentevella identified them as Elreen Ann Ando, who made her Olympic debut in Tokyo; Vanessa Sarno, Kristel Macrohon and Rosegie Ramos.
Puentevella also said he has left the door open for an unprecedented fifth straight Olympics for Diaz, who will be 33 by the Paris Olympics comes around.
“Kung kaya ng katawan ni Hidy sa Paris, she will be 33 at that time, puwede siyang mag-medalya muli pero mag-sasakripisyo siya,” he said. “But if she retires, she will be our national women’s coach for sure. No one can compare with her and she will teach the four young lifters that are coming up.”
He urged Ando, Sarno, Macrohon and Ramos to follow the model set by the four-time Olympic veteran whose sacrifice, discipline and dedication powered her to the gold medal and ended the country’s 97-yeardry spell in the quadrennial sports festival.
“Dapat gayahin nila si Hidy who had no holidays, no Christmas, no New year, no birthday celebrations while she was in Kuala Lumpurtraining for the Tokyo Olympics,” Puentevella said.
With Chinese coach Gao Kaiwen set to return home to Beijing and unlikely to come back full-time, Puentevella said Diaz and her Guamanian fitness and conditioning coach, Julius Naranjo, plan to return in the third week of September to Malaysia to resume training.
“As the Olympic champion, Hidy wants to prepare hard for the world championships in Lima, Peru in November so is going back with Julius to Malaysia in the third week of September to resume training,” Puentevella said.
Ando had her baptism of fire in Tokyo where she wound up seventh among 12 entries in the women’s 64-kilogram division.
“Si Ando nakapasok na siya sa mata ng karayom. Gusto kong dumaan siya kagaya ng iyak noon ni Hidylin (during the 2012 London Olympics),” Puentevella said.
“Vanessa Sarno is now the Asian champion at 17 and is turning 18,” the former commissioner of the Philippine Sports Commission said of the Boholana sensation,who stamped her class in the Asian weightlifting meet last April in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, bagging two golds and a silver in the 71-kilogram division.
“Nandiyan din si Kristel Macrohon. Baka magbago ‘yung attitude niya (after Hidilyn won the gold),” Puentevella said of the 2019 SEA Games gold medalist in the women’s 76kg category who also won two bronze medals in the Asian meet.
Ramos, 16, is a Zamboanga City native and protégé of Diaz at her own gym near her home in Barangay Mampang, Puentevella said in the public sports program backed by San Miguel Corp., Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp., Smart, Milo, Amelie Hotel, Braska Restaurant and powered by Upstream Media.
