EAGER to please the hometown audience and eyeing a podium finish after a runner-up stint in the short program, Fil-Am Paolo Borromeo’s bid sadly went awry, stumbling thrice and falling to 11th place after the men’s individual free skate in the Asian Open Figure Skating Trophy last Tuesday night.
Entering the free skate in second spot with 64.81 points in the short program, Borromeo’s nerves got the best of him at the SM Mall of Asia skating rink in Pasay City, slipping near the start, middle and at the end of his routine played to the music of the movie “Hole Up Til Sunrise, I Lied to You.”
As a result of his erratic outing, the Los Angeles-born skater, whose parents hail from Cebu, was penalized and mustered only 53.85 points, winding up 16th in the event, which brought him down to a total score of 140.51 points.
Youthful South Korean Hyungyeom Kim, 20, also topped the free skate to bag the gold with 215. 14 points, Taiwanese Yu Hsiang Li (194.34) settled for the silver while North Korean KwangBom Han (191.99) won bronze in the meet supported by the ISU Development Commission, Philippine Sports Commission and Milo.
“My main goal in the competition was just to skate clean programs. Placing strong was not really on my mind. But after I did really well in the short programs, maybe I was trying a little bit too hard,” said Borromeo of his meltdown in the second phase of the event.
“Maybe, I made it hard on myself by not relaxing and just letting it happen,” rued the skater. “That is how it is so we move on.”
He said that he would return to Los Angeles to resume his training before returning to Asia to compete in the 2026 Winter Olympic Games qualifying tournament slated Sept. 18 to 21 in Beijing, China.
Maxine Bautista was the best Filipina skater in the women’s individual event, winding up 11th with a combined tally of 105.69 points, CathrynLimketkai was 12th (105.03) and Sofia Frank 16th (88.07).
China completed a 1-2-3 sweep of the medals, with Zhang Ruiyang taking gold (168.41), Zhu Yi silver (160.63) and Xu Wandi bronze (142.86).
Skating chief Nikki Cheng said that the association learned a lot in staging the competition “and, hopefully, we can do better in conducting future international tournaments drawing from our experience here.”
