Philippine sports

Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes

Ariel Ian Clarito

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Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes

ICONIC. Sprinter Lydia de Vega is one of the most popular Filipino athletes of all time.

Photo from Pinoy Athletics

As we celebrate Women’s Month this March, here’s a look back on some of the outstanding ladies of Philippine sports

Filipina athletes have stood through the years on equal footing with their male counterparts. The accolades that our female athletes have garnered have been etched in the annals of Philippine sports and have helped lay the foundation on which the Filipina athletes of the present stand and continue to excel.

As we celebrate Women’s Month this March, here’s a look back on the athletes who paved the way and exemplified how strong, proud, and brave the Filipina truly is. 

Lydia de Vega-Mercado, athletics

The first true transcendent Filipina athlete was Lydia de Vega-Mercado. 

A two-time Olympian, she was not only an elite sprinter but also a star athlete, recognized by the entire sports world, her influence extending even beyond sports. She was the most recognizable sportswoman of the country in the 1980s. 

As a 16-year-old, she broke the Asian record in the women’s 200 meter on her way to clinching the gold in the 1981 SEA Games. She also won the gold in the 400 meter event. 

Her rise as a force in the international scene coincided with that of another young track star, PT Usha of India, and this gave rise to the decade’s most compelling rivalry in Asian athletics.

Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes

But De Vega-Mercado was the undisputed sprint queen of Asia. She won the gold in the 100 meter event of the 1982 and the 1986 editions of the Asian Games. 

She became the second Filipina after discus thrower Josephine de la Viña to become a gold medalist in both the Asian Games and the Asian Athletic Championships.

Lydia de Vega (front) during the opening of the 30th Southeast Asian Games on November 30, 2019.
Photo by Josh Albelda/Rappler
Bong Coo, bowling

Olivia “Bong” Coo is the most accomplished athlete of the Philippines, regardless of gender, in any sport. She is also the first Filipino athlete to make it to the Guinness Book of World Records. 

She owns the most number of Asian Games gold medals among all Filipino athletes. In 1978, she became the second Filipina since Mona Sulaiman to win 3 golds in the Asian Games. She won two more golds in 1986. 

Coo is a four-time world champion and was named the World Bowler of the Year in 1986. She became one of the first ever inductees when the International Bowling Hall of Fame was inaugurated in 1993. 

As a member of the Philippine national team, she has amassed a total of 78 medals won in regional and world competitions, 37 of which were gold medals. 

Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes
Elma Muros-Posadas, athletics

Whether it was the sprint, relays, hurdles or heptathlon, Elma Muros-Posadas knew only one thing. That was to excel.

But it was in her pet event, the long jump, where she had no equal in the region, winning an unprecedented 8 gold medals in the SEA Games. She also bagged a long jump bronze in the 1994 Asian Games in Hiroshima, and two silvers and two bronzes in the same event in the Asian Athletic Championships. 

In the 1995 SEA Games, she became the region’s new sprint queen by blazing her way to first place finishes in both the 100 meter and 200 meter events. She was the country’s most bemedalled athlete that year with 3 golds after she also successfully defended her long jump crown.

Muros-Posadas is in the record books tied with Myanmar legend Jennifer Tin Lay for the most number of gold medals won in the SEA Games at 15.

At 17 years old, Muros-Posadas represented the country in the 1984 Olympics. Her second Olympic appearance came in 1996.

Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes
Haydee Coloso-Espino, swimming

Female athletes were allowed to compete in only one event, athletics, in the first Asian Games in 1951. The gender restrictions finally eased up in the 1954 Asian Games in Manila, and 16-year-old Haydee Coloso made sure to showcase what Filipinas were capable of. 

Coloso won gold medals in the 100 meter freestyle and 100 meter butterfly, plus a silver in the 4×100 meter freestyle relay, making her the most bemedalled Philippine athlete in the second edition of the Asian Games.

She won another gold and 3 more silvers in the 1958 Tokyo Asian Games. She also competed in the 1960 Rome Olympics.

Coloso-Espino is in the country’s record books for a number of accomplishments as she and fellow swimmer Jocelyn Von Geese were the first Filipinas to win the gold in the Asian Games. 

Coloso-Espino holds the record for the most Asian Games medals (10) won by a Philippine athlete. She is also the first swimmer to have been named to the Philippine Sports Hall of Fame.

Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes
Mona Sulaiman, athletics

Mona Sulaiman was the queen of athletics, and she was an even bigger star outside of the tracks for standing her ground against discrimination. 

Born in 1942 in Cotabato, Sulaiman’s talent catapulted her to national prominence as the country’s best bet in athletics. She was a two-time Olympian, making the quarterfinals of the 100 meter sprint in 1960 and joining two events in 1964.

In the Asian scene, there was no one better than Sulaiman. She became the first Filipino athlete to win 3 gold medals in the Asian Games. In the 1962 edition in Jakarta, Sulaiman bagged the gold in the 100 meters and 200 meters, becoming Asia’s first double gold winner in the sprint events. She also won the gold in the 4 x 100 meter relay and a bronze in shot put. 

She could have competed in the 1966 Asian Games and the 1968 Olympics, but she chose to walk away, hurt and insulted, after being compelled to undergo the indignity of a gender test.

Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes
Lita dela Rosa, bowling

One of three bowlers inducted in the Philippine Sports Hall of Fame, Lita dela Rosa is recognized both locally and internationally as one of the greatest bowlers of all time. For good reason.

She is the first Filipina to win the prestigious World Cup, a feat she accomplished in 1978 in Bogota, Colombia. She was at her most dominant in the 1979 World Championships held in Manila. In this competition, she won the gold in the women’s singles event and the coveted master’s event. She also copped the gold in the doubles event and the silver in the ladies trio.

In the process, Dela Rosa became the first woman in history to be the holder of the two world titles at the same time. 

Dela Rosa also stamped her class in the Asian Games, winning a gold and a silver in 1978 in the Bangkok edition.

She died in 1994 and was posthumously inducted in the International Bowling Hall of Fame in 2000.

Josephine de la Vina, athletics

The most enduring record in Philippine athletics is in women’s discus throw. 

During the 1971 USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships held in Bakersfield, Josephine de la Vina registered a throw of 54.71 meters which to this day remains the Philippine’s best and the oldest national record. 

De la Vina was born in Iloilo to a Cebuana mother and a Mexican-American father from whom she got her height (6’0) and heft (161 lbs).

She is a three-time Olympian, competing in 1964 in Tokyo, in 1968 in Mexico City as the only Asian in the field, and in 1972 in Munich where she barely missed a spot in the final round.

De la Vina is the first Filipina gold medal winner in both the Asian Games and the Asian Athletic Championships. She set the continental record when she emerged champion of the 1966 Asian Games, improving on her bronze medal finish in 1962. 

In the inaugural Asian Athletic Championships in 1973, she emerged as the meet’s first ever discus champion.

Thelma Barina-Rojas, volleyball

Hard as it might be to imagine in this day and age, but in the 1983 Asian Women’s Volleyball Championships, the Philippines finished 5th among 9 participants. This was also the time the Philippines reigned supreme in women’s volleyball in Southeast Asia. 

A lot of that could be attributed to an open spiker from Southwestern University in Cebu who bannered the Philippines’ attacks and was the skipper of the national squad.

From 1981 to 1993, Thelma Barina-Rojas was a member of the Philippine national team. She was an instrumental component in the team’s success as they won the Southeast Asian Games gold medal in 1981, 1985, 1987, and 1993.

Barina-Rojas was at one point arguably the best player not only in the country but the whole of Southeast Asia as she was named the Best Open Spiker and the Most Valuable Player of the 1987 Jakarta SEA Games. 

In 1991 when the Philippines placed 3rd, she was named the Best Receiver of the tournament. 

Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes
Arianne Cerdeña-Valdez, bowling

A member of the national team beginning in 1981, Arianne Cerdeña has won in every level of competition there is in bowling.

She earned her first SEA Games gold in 1983 in the team event and her last in 1999. She also copped a team gold and a doubles bronze in the 1986 Asian Games. 

Cerdeña was a silver medalist in the trio event of the FIQ World Championship where she teamed up with fellow all-time greats Bong Coo and Lita dela Rosa. 

In the World Games hosted by Germany in 1989, she also brought home two silver medals. 

But it was in 1988 that Cerdeña made history when bowling was finally played in the Seoul Olympics, albeit only as a demonstration sport. Twelve of the best female bowlers in the world saw action. Cerdeña topped the preliminaries and went on to win the previous Olympic gold.

For her feat, she was named the World Bowler of the Year for 1988.

Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes
Joan Chan-Tabanag, archery

No matter the distance, Joan Chan-Tabanag could shoot straight and hit the bulls-eye. This was on display in the 1985 SEA Games when the then 21-year-old repeatedly fended off the challenge of archery legend Kusuma Wardhani, Indonesia’s first Olympic medalist.

Chan-Tabanag shot her way to gold-medal finishes in the individual recurve, individual recurve 50 meters, and individual 60 meters. She also won a bronze in the individual recurve 70 meters.

She carried over her success to the 1987 SEA Games when she won another gold, a silver, and a bronze. Her last SEA Games individual recurve gold medal happened in the 1995 SEA Games in Chiang Mai.

What makes Chan-Tabanag an even bigger icon is her longevity. In the 2011 Asian Archery Grand Prix, she was part of the Philippine team that bagged the gold in the compound team event. 

Thirty years after her impressive medal romp in the SEA Games, she also won a bronze in the team event of the 2015 Singapore SEA Games.

Bea Lucero-Lhuillier, gymnastics/taekwondo

In the 1987 Jakarta SEA Games, a young girl two months shy of turning 15 burst into the national and international consciousness as she dominated the sport of gymnastics. 

Bea Lucero-Lhuillier displayed impeccable form in winning gold medals in the individual and balance beam events. She also snagged 3 silver medals from the floor exercise, vault, and team events. 

She could have made the 1988 Seoul Olympics, but internal squabbling and politicking among leaders of the gymnastics federation prevented her from joining the qualifiers which laid to waste her two-year preparation.  

She then switched sports and took up taekwondo. She earned her black belt within 10 months of learning the sport. In 1991, she became the first athlete in SEA Games history to be a gold medalist in two different sports when she emerged as the meet’s taekwondo champion. 

In 1992, her Olympic dream finally came true as she competed in taekwondo, which debuted as a demonstration sport in Barcelona. She made the semifinals of the featherweight division and became an Olympic bronze medalist.

Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes
Akiko Thomson-Guevara, swimming

Akiko Thomson-Guevara is a three-time Olympian, competing in 4 events in each of her Olympic appearances in 1988, 1992, and 1996. Her love affair with swimming began when she was 6 years old at the Army Navy Club which was next door to where her family lived.

Born in 1974, she became part of the Philippine national team when she was 12 years old. In 1987, a month before she turned 13 years old, she splashed her way to the 100 meter backstroke gold medal and the 200 meter backstroke silver medal at the Jakarta SEA Games. 

Before she could even turn 14, she became an Olympian when she represented the country in the 1988 Games held in Seoul.

Thomson-Guevara has 8 SEA Games gold medals to her name, the most by any Filipina swimmer. She was at her sharpest in the 1989 edition when she earned 3 gold medals and one silver medal.

She also saw action in the US NCAA as the co-captain of the University of California at Berkeley.

Wonder women: The all-time best Filipina athletes

– Rappler.com

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