FILE–PH wushu artist Gideon Padua. –WUSHU-SANDA TEAM PHILIPPINES PAGE
HANGZHOU, China – The Philippine wushu team is assured of three bronze medals at the 19th Asian Games, with sanda fighters Arnel Mandal (men’s 56kg), Gideon Fred Padua (men’s 60kg) and Clemente Tabugara (men’s 65kg) in the semis finals are.
However, Wushu officials are skeptical about allowing Padua to face Iran’s Shoja Panahigelehkolaei in the semi-finals.
Padua was hit by an elbow and suffered a broken nose bridge during an impressive quarter-final win over Turkmenistan’s Agajumageldi Yazymov.
Meanwhile, Johnzenth Gajo did not attract much attention from the judges and finished empty-handed in the final of the men’s daoshu and gunshu all-round in wushu.
Gajo, 21, finished sixth in the daoshu discipline with 9,680 points, but plunged deeper into the rankings after settling for a ninth-best 9,403 points in the gunshu among 11 finalists.
China’s Chang Zhizhao topped the event with combined scores of 9.826 and 9.800, while Singapore’s Jowen Si Wei Lim took silver (9.736 and 9.743). Indonesian Seraf Siregar came third (9.733 and 9.740).
Gajo, a bronze medalist in the men’s duilian at the 2019 Southeast Asian Games, failed to join Jones Inso, who secured the bronze ahead of the national Taolu aces in the men’s individual Taijiquan-Taijijian all-around .