BMX Racing’s a team effort for bronze medalist Patrick Coo (right) and Daniel Caluag.

HANGZHOU — Patrick Coo clinched bronze on Sunday in Chun’an to continue the Philippines medal tradition in BMX racing of cycling in the Asian Games.

Coo’s bronze was the seventh for Team Philippines and it came the morning after Ernest John ‘EJ” Obiena won an expected gold medal in men’s pole vault.

“I’m very happy but hurting for sure,” said the 21-year-old Coo, who scraped the upper part of his right thigh after crashing in the first moto of the 12-cyclist final. “I ripped my pants in the process and got it fixed immediately.”

Japan’s Asuma Nakai, 23, and junior bronze medalist in the UCI world championships last year in Nantes (France) won gold, followed very closely by Southeast Asian Games champion Komet Sukpraset of Thailand and Coo.

With Coo’s bronze, the Philippines had a medal in each of the last three Asian Games—Danny Caluag won the country’s one and only gold medal in Incheon in 2014 and got bronze in Indonesia five years ago.

Caluag, 36, was in the thick of the race but was shoved to sixth place in the final—he raced still recovering from a broken rib he sustained in training in the US.

Coo, an Olympic Solidarity scholar, felt amazing about his stint in Hangzhou.
“I feel very happy, I went straight to the biggest one, the Asian Games,” said Coo as he thanked Philippine Olympic Committee president Rep. Abraham “Bambol” Tolentino, who heads PhilCycling.

“This could kick off more major accomplishments for Patrick,” Tolentino said. “He’s only 21, so young, and he’s been training seriously and diligently the past year or so under the Olympic Solidarity program.”

Tolentino said cycling has again confirmed its consistency in contributing to a medal in the Asian Games.

“It’s a motivation for PhilCycling to achieve more in the international arena,” he said.

Coo flew in four days ago from Aigle, Switzerland, straight from his UCI World Cycling Center training camp. He had to spend a night in Hangzhou—some 150 km from Chun’an where the cycling competitions are staged—because he was directed to the main Athletes Village instead of a bus to the cycling venue.

His crash in the first moto on Sunday wasn’t anything unique in Coo. He almost always does, but he’s been trying to correct his mistakes.

“I’m fast and everything, but I get so much adrenalin most of the time. I need to take it step by step, by staying calm more on the bike,” he said.

Coo called his parents in the US—Benjamin who’s from Iloilo and Romilyn Lag from Cagayan de Oro minutes after the race.

“They told me to pamper myself when I get back to the Philippines,” said Coo, who stays in Tagaytay City which has the country’s only UCI BMX race track.

“I haven’t eaten rice for the past three months while I was in Switzerland, so time to gorge in Tagaytay,” he said, adding “and a lot of isaw.”

(ai/mnm)

PATRICK COO (206) in action in the men’s elite race.

MISFORTUNES struck Daniel Caluag and Patrick Coo as Thailand and Japan took the elite category gold medals and, more importantly, berths to the Paris 2024 Olympics at the close of the Asian Cycling Confederation (ACC) BMX Championships at the Tagaytay City BMX Park on Sunday.

Caluag, the Philippines’ sole gold medalist at the Incheon 2014 Asian Games, lost some two seconds when his front wheel got stuck momentarily at the starting gate in the semifinals of the men’s elite race.

The London 2012 Olympian managed to get his desired speed and rhythm at the table top but couldn’t get into the final of the championships calendared by both the International Cycling Union (UCI) and Asian Cycling Confederation and hosted by the PhilCycling and Tagaytay City led by Philippine Olympic Committee president Rep. Abraham “Bambol” Tolentino.

“Breaks of the game,” said Caluag, 36, who has never ceased to train in the US while juggling his profession as a Registered Nurse—he’s completing his Nursing Administration Masters—and dad to his two daughters and husband to former BMX racer Stephanie, who’s also a nurse in the US.

Coo, a former Asian junior champion, made the final and was in contention to break up front until he was caught in a tight bind also on the table top.

He was unable to squeeze into the front in the process lost his left foot on the pedal and was left behind by the eight-rider final to finish last behind gold medalist Komet Sukpraser.

Sukpraser and women’s elite winner Hatakeyama of Japan earned automatic qualification to the Paris Olympics from the championships witnessed by ACC secretary -general Onkar Singh of India and UCI management committee member Datuk Amarjit Singh of Maalaysia.

Tagaytay City’s hosting of the championships earned praises from both UCI and ACC officials that inspired Tolentino to seek hosting major international competitions in the future.

“It was near perfect,” said Tolentino of the championships. “Near because we missed out on outright qualification for Paris. Breaks indeed.”

Indonesia’s Rio Akbar and Fasya Ahsana Rifki completed the men’s elite podium, while Wanyl Liao of China and Kanami Tanno of Japan finished second and third, respectively, in the women’s elite race.

Also winning on Sunday were Indonesia’s Shifa Maulidina Qotron Nada (women) and Japan’s Hyoga Kiuchi (men) in the junior race and Japan’s Neneka Nishimura (women) and Adiya Fajar Putu Soekarno (men) in the under-23 category.

(ai/mnm)