Evergreen Marestella Torres-Sunang was in vintage form on Sunday to rule the women’s long jump with a leap of 6.11 meters at the conclusion of the Milo-Patafa Performance and Time Trials at the Imus Sports Complex in Imus, Cavite.
A four-time Southeast Asian Games long jump queen, Sunang bucked the strong early morning headwinds that swept through the track in nailing the victory on her second jump, avenging her loss to Katherine Khay Santos in the Ayala Philippines Athletics Championships in Baguio last December.
Santos, who won her earlier duel with Sunang on the countback with a jump of 6.06 meters, had difficulty with her check marks before take-off and settled for second in the meet backed by Lily’s Peanut Butter.
Abcede Agamos was third (5.49) at the end of the three-day competition organized by the Philippine Athletics Track and Field Association and also supported by the Philippine Sports Commission as part of the national track and field tryouts for the 31st Vietnam Southeast Asian Games in May.
“Masaya ako sa talon ko. Naging maganda pa rin ang fitness and conditioning ko,” noted Sunang, who turned 41 last Feb. 20, of her improvement of five centimeters over her last performance in the Pines City.
“Because of her age, we revised our tapering and recovery program for Marestella and reduced her stride from 20 to 18 so we won’t fade during her take-off. This has all been trial and error, but seems to be working,” noted national long jump coach Joebert Delicano.
Delicano was optimistic that with still two months to go before the Vietnam SEA Games “we can pull her (Torres) so she can be jumping between 6.20 to 6.30 that would boost her chances of a podium finish.”
“I had problems with my check marks so I wasn’t able to take off properly. Lessons learned because you can’t win always. I need to practice more on my full approach and jumps,” rued Santos of her sub-par showing. “But we still have some competitions left and we aim to perform better.”
Both jumpers were confident that they would be able to meet the qualifying bronze medal standard of 6.16 meters in the last 2019 SEA Games in succeeding meets.
Former Palarong Pambansa standout and UP varsity team member Clint Neri leaped 7.21 meters to top the men’s long jump.
Both SEA Games bronze medalists in the men’s 4×400-meter men’s and women’s relays three years ago, Frederick Ramirez and Jessel Lumapas swept the men’s and women’s 400-meter runs in times of 47.42 and 57.31 seconds, respectively.
Fellow national teammates Edwin Giron Jr. and Bernalyn Bejoy also stamped their class in the men’s and women’s 800-meter runs with personal best times of 1:52.84 and 2:13.52, respectively.
UE varsity team member James Orduna clocked 1:34.65 to top the men’s 5,000-meter race to round up the morning results.