TAEKWONDO

Taekwondo jin Alora caps Filipinos’ campaign in Rio

RIO DE JANEIRO—Kirstie Elaine Alora brings to a close the country’s drought-snapping

The 26-year-old Alora comes into the much-anticipated heavyweight (+64 kilograms) tussle the
decided underdog, having lost to the former world and Beijing Olympics champion, 2-1, in the
only time they clashed, back in 2009.

The fight kicks off at 9:30 p.m. (Manila time).

Whatever the result of the much-anticipated fight, the 13-athlete Philippine contingent had
already accomplished what it came here for—end an alarming Olympic futility with a medal.

Weightlifter Hidilyn Diaz made sure of that on the fourth day of the 207-nation Games by nailing
the silver in the 53 kg class and winning the heart of a nation that had waited two decades to
toast a new Olympic hero.

Alora could seal the country’s best Olympic performance ever with a second medal, but the
prospect seemed as formidable as it looked on paper in a taekwondo division teeming with
taller, more experienced fighters.

Espinoza is treated as a national heroine in Mexico, one of the only two women from her
country to win an Olympic gold medal.
The world No. 1-ranked female heavyweight battled the last of the original 13 Filipino athletes
in these Summer Games, one who had toiled for nearly a month here with her coach in hopes
of bagging the country’s first Olympic medal in her sport.

On the eve of the match, Alora told Filipino reporters she was ready for the “toughest fight” of
her life.

“I’m very confident that I can do my best to deliver a medal,” said the 5-foot-8, 175-pound
fighter from Binan, Laguna, who arrived here as early as July 23, a good eight days before the
Games’ opening ceremonies. “I just want to fight and perform well.”

Coach Roberto Cruz had said Alora would have to fight a lot quicker to have a better chance
against Espinoza, reputedly one of her sport’s most powerful kickers but one who frowned on
the sport’s electronic scoring system which she described as inaccurate.

“I have a little problem with the system,” Espinoza told the Olympic information service. “With
any touch, the sensor records points. If you hit it too hard it does not register.”

Alora, a two-time bronze medalist in the Asian Games, said she had seen many of Espinoza’s
fight videos and believed she had a chance.

“I know how she moves,” she said. “We have prepared several moves of our own to counter
her.”

Chief of mission Joey Romasanta said a medal from Alora would already be a bonus. Together
with Diaz’s silver, the seemingly meager harvest would still better the country’s three-medal feat
in the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics.
In the only Olympic Games where the Philippines won more than one medal, high jumper
Simeon Toribio, bantamweight boxer Jose Villanueva and 200-meter breaststroke swimmer
Teofilo Yldefonso bagged a bronze each.

A defeat to Espinoza, however, would not automatically knock Alora out of the competition.
Under the sport’s compassionate system of progression called repechage, first-round losers
stayed alive for the bronze-medal fight provided the winning fighter moved all the way to the
finals.

Alora needed to win her first two fights to contend for the bronze medal, three wins to seize a
finals berth.

Ironically, it would be easier for the 5-foot-8 College of Saint Benilde graduate to clinch a spot in
the finals with three straight victories rather than reach the bronze-medal phase and then string
up at least two more wins. Cruz said that, in the latter case, Alora would dispute the bronze with
any two of the four 6-footers from the much-taller upper half of the draw.

Espinoza also stands at 5-8.

Alora’s fight came three days after long jumper Marestella Torres-Sunang and hurdler Eric Cray
fell short of the finals in their respective events at Olympic Stadium.

Cray came as far as the semifinals of the 400-meter hurdles but the three-time Olympian
Sunang, hampered by a left hip injury she sustained in the warmups, missed a berth in the final
12 of long jump by 31 centimeters.

Apart from Diaz, Cray, Sunang and Alora, the other Filipino campaigners here who have gone
back to Manila or the United States were swimmers Jasmine Alkhaldi and Jessie Khing Lacuna,
judoka Kodo Nakano, table netter Ian Lariba, boxers Rogen Ladon and Charly Suarez, golfer
Miguel Tabuena, weightlifter Renato Colonia and marathoner Mary Joy Tabal.
 Olympics: Alora bows to Mexican, waits for repechage bouts

RIO DE JANEIRO–Kirstie Elaine Alora failed to solve the riddle of Maria Espinoza’s in-and-out
lunges and bowed to the multititled Mexican, 4-1, in their first-round match Saturday morning
in taekwondo’s over-67 kilogram division at Carioca Arena in the Rio Olympics here.

Espinoza picked up the first point on a counter kick 82 seconds into the match, yielded a point
after getting knocked down by a well-timed frontal kick by Alora halfway through the second
round, but completely took over from there.

The 26-year-old, 175-pound Alora tried to claw back by getting more mobile on the attack in the
second and third rounds but Espinoza scored the next three points off lunges that threw the
Filipino off her rhythm.

But all is not lost for Alora despite the defeat, thanks to taekwondo’s repechage. The first-round
loser gets a chance to fight for the bronze medal provided the opponent who beat her goes all
the way to the finals.

“I could not fire off shots because of (Espinoza’s) footwork,” said Alora as she and coach Roberto
Cruz headed for the dugout to plan a possible fight in the repechage, set in the afternoon. “I
could not anticipate what she’d do next because she kept moving away after each attack.”

Espinoza, the former world and Olympic champion, is heavily tipped to advance to the gold-
medal fight from the upper half of the 16-fighter draw.
The 27-year-old army private, a national heroine in Mexico, advanced to the quarterfinals
against Morroco’s Wiam Dislam, needing a win to at least seal a spot in the bronze-medal
round. Another win would clinch her a finals berth.