Obiena, Yulo lead PSA choices for June

By Robert Andaya

The Philippine Sportswriters Association (PSA), the country’s oldest media organization,  unanimously picked pole vault champion EJ Obiena and gymnastics hero Carlos Edriel Yulo  as its leading honorees for the month of June.

Obiena continued to make the country proud  as he captured the  gold medal in the Sparebanken Vest Bergen Jump Challenge in Bergen, Norway last month.

With the feat, Obiena  cracked one of the most elusive barriers in athletics and joined the elite list  of  pole vault’s 6.0-meter club that also included Sergey Bubka and reigning world and Olympic king Mondo Duplantis.

Yulo, on the other hand, stanped his class in the Asian Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Singapore, where he anchored the Philippines’ three-gold, three-silver and three-bronze haul.

Aside from winning parallel bars, vault, and floor exercise events, Yulo. also pocketed the silver medal in the Individual All-around and  bronze in the horizontal bar.   

Also worth recognizing for the month of June were the achievements of Team Philippines in the Asean Para Games in Cambodia, Singapore-based bowler Zach Sales Ramin, and the IM Daniel Quizon-led chess team in the 21st Asean+ Age Group Championships in Thailand.

The Filipinos collared  34 golds, 33 silvers, and 50 bronzes in the Cambodia Para,Games  meet to surpass the 28-30-46 collected last year in Indonesia. 

At the forefront of this were six-gold winner Darry Bernardo and the chess delegation, which delivered 13 mints.

Ramin, only 17,  topped the 53rd Singapore International Open to become the first Filipino male bowler to win the prestigious event. 

Elsewhere, Quizon dominated the standard and blitz events in the premier U20 division to earn his third GM norm as he spearheaded the Philippines’ 16-gold, 37-silver, eight-bronze harvest and second overall standing behind only Vietnam in the tournament.