Southeast Asia has never been among the leaders in any Olympics. But how did it fare in the Beijing Olympics? Rank/G/S/B/Total Medals (Rank by Total) 31 THA - Thailand 2 2 0 4 (44) 42 INA - Indonesia 1 1 3 5 (38) 71 MAS - Malaysia 0 1 0 1 (69) 71 SIN - Singapore 0 1 0 1 (69) 71 VIE - Vietnam 0 1 0 1 (69) Southeast Asia Total: 3 6 3 12 World Total Medals: 165 165 202 532 Thailand led with 2 gold and 2 silver, followed by Indonesia with 1 gold, 1 silver and 3 bronze. Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam tied with a silver medal each. Details of the medal winners: Thailand Boxing Men's Light Welter (64kg) BOONJUMNONG Manus (S) Men's Fly (51kg) JONGJOHOR Somjit (G) Weightlifting Women's 53kg JAROENRATTANATARAKOON P. (G) Taekwondo Women -49kg PUEDPONG Buttree (S) Indonesia Badminton Women's Singles YULIANTI Maria Kristin (B) Men's Doubles KIDO Markis, SETIAWAN Hendra (G) Mixed Doubles LILIYANA, WIDIANTO Nova (S) Weightlifting Men's 56kg IRAWAN Eko Yuli (B) Men's 62kg TRIYATNO (B) Malaysia Badminton Men's Singles LEE Chong Wei (S) Singapore Table Tennis Women's Team (S) FENG Tianwei, LI Jia Wei, WANG Yue Gu Vietnam Weightlifting Men's 56kg HOANG Anh Tuan (S) For Malaysia and especially Singapore, it had been a long time since they won an Olympic medal. With an ever dominant China and the USA, will developing and small countries be able to improve their medal haul? It remains to be seen. But for a small country like 13th placed Jamaica which won 6/ 3/ 2 (11), and 15th placed Kenya with 5/ 5/ 4 (14 ) there is still hope for others in the same category. London Olympics 2012 may yet witness some outstanding performances from such countries!
THA once again has proved that they're still South East Asia sport king at Olympic arena. This condition is similar with four years ago OG when Thailand brought 2 golds and Indonesia grabbed 1. Yup, Jamaica and Kenya has booked superb achievement in Beijing Games, SEA countries should be inspired by them.
it'll be hard to match the jamaicans, we will never have the sprint kings and queens to compete in the track and field events.
i think they are naturally born sprinter and long distance runners. Our canadian 1996 atlanta gold medalist for 100m and 4x100m sprinting was born in jamaica too
Laments the Philippines Su.nStar Cebu Sunday, August 24, 2008 Producing world-beaters in sports By Frank Malilong The Other Side RP-0, PRP-8. That’s how the scorecard will appear when the Beijing Olympics draws to a close later today. We all know who RP is, while PRP is none other than the Personal Republic of Phelps. As in Michael Phelps. No attempt at comparison between guavas and apples here but one cannot help but notice one man’s dominance in sports while looking at the continued disgraceful failure of a nation of almost a hundred million people in the same human endeavor. Make it nations; we’re not alone. The medal tally by New York Times as of yesterday morning showed that with only two days of competition left and about 80 percent of the events decided, 71 out of the 150 countries that participated in this year’s Summer Games have won medals. We’re in the shamed majority. Sadly, most of our Southeast Asian (SEA) neighbors are not around to provide company to our misery. Indonesia won a gold, a silver and a bronze, all in badminton, to tie for 36th place. Thailand had a gold in weightlifting to add to its silver in taekwondo, good enough for a logjam with seven other countries at 50th in the medal standings. The SEA Games powerhouse is however expected to more than double its medal tally at the end of the boxing competitions. Singapore won silver in table tennis as did Malaysia in badminton and Vietnam in weightlifting. Only Laos, Cambodia, Brunei and Myanmar among the SEAG members joined us in laying a big fat Olympic egg. No offense meant to our Olympians who undoubtedly did their best to make our country proud but I don’t think any one of them will ever become world-beaters. In swimming, for example, even if we train our flag-bearers by making them swim a river upstream while being chased by a horde of hungry crocodiles, we can never see a Phelps or a Kosuke Kitajima rise from among them. We simply do not have the physical attributes. So what do I propose we do? One, let’s concentrate on the regional meets and leave the Olympics to the sporting giants. In the world stage, our athletes are lambs in a den of lions. You don’t feel good watching them gobbled up on a regular basis. In the meantime, go to the grassroots in search of boys and girls whom we can train for 10 to 15 years before unleashing them to the world. China did and continues to do that successfully. That’s for the long term. If we want immediate results because we can’t wait to hear our national anthem sung in the awarding ceremonies, then let’s buy the best athletes in the world. Bahrain did just that. The tiny Persian Gulf sheikdom imported Rashid Ramzi from Morocco and granted him citizenship and all the perks that petrodollars can buy. Ramzi promptly returned the favor by winning gold for his new country in the 1500-meter run. Bahrain is filthy rich, you might say. Where do we get the money? But why should we pay money to our “imports” when we can always have an exchange deal? If we are willing to cede part of the national territory to a group as a reward for fighting our soldiers, why not with someone who can immediately put us in the world sports map? Do you think Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt would not salivate at the prospect of owning one fourth of Palawan where he can set up his own government and play reggae? Could Phelps refuse an offer to make the land mass and waters surrounding Sulu as his personal romping ground in exchange for donning Philippine colors? Think about it and please, don’t go to the Supreme Court for a TRO before we could even initial the MOA.
Sun.Star Cebu Sunday, August 24, 2008 As the 8-8-8 Games conclude, our score: 0-0-0 By John Pages Match Point HARRY Tañamor lost in the first round. Eric Ang lost in the first round. Mark Javier lost in the first round. Henry Dagmil and Maristella Torres lost in the first round. So did swimmers Miguel Molina, James Walsh, Daniel Coakley, Ryan Arabejo and Christel Simms. Sheila Mae Perez lost in the first round. Same with our last hope in taekwondo, Toni Rivero and Thsomlee Go—all ousted in Round One. The conclusion? It was RP’s worst showing on earth’s greatest show. Our neighbors, how did they perform? Vietnam won one silver, Singapore won one silver, Malaysia another silver, Thailand one gold and one silver, Indonesia one gold, one silver and three bronze medals—while our nation, which proudly claimed to be the 23rd Southeast Asian (SEA) Games champions just three years ago won, nula. Kosong. Neoni. Nocht. In plain language you and I understand: itlog. Why? What happened? Who’s to blame? What do we do? Those are the 1-2-3-4 worded questions in every one of the 91 million Filipinos’ minds. Here are a few thoughts on our catastrophe.... The world stage has become tougher. Take taekwondo. A Korean martial art that used to be dominated by Asians—not anymore. The entire world has taken notice that this demonstration sport in the 1988 and 1992 Games (before being officially part of the 2000 Sydney Olympics) brings home, for both men and women, a total of eight gold medals. That’s a lot. And so a lot of nations have joined the fray to snatch those medals. The Olympics, unlike those of decades past, have become brutal, demanding, ruthless. To win gold, or even a bronze, would take not only guts, fortitude and resilience—but also luck. Another advice? Abandon post. That’s what all our sports leaders ought to do. From Peping Cojuangco to Butch Ramirez to the amateur boxing head Manny Lopez to the various NSA heads—everyone of them—should troop to Malacañang, bow their heads to GMA, then hand over a two-worded letter that reads, “I resign.” Our president must, the week after the Olympics debacle, start with a blank piece of paper for which she can write new names. A new strategy. That’s also imperative. A grassroots-based sports plan that not only allows our elite athletes to train one, two or three years ahead, but decades in advance. Look at China. Look at how they identify and train children as young as five. We have fallen, no doubt. While other nations have grown, as the Olympic motto reads, “Citius, Altius, Fortius,” which means “Faster, Higher, Stronger,” we’ve achieved the opposite. We’ve slowed, dropped, weakened. Politics. That’s another reason for our washout and collapse. We fight not only in the political arena but also in sports. Look at basketball. Look at billiards. For all our love for trash-talking, I suggest the Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) sponsor a new event in the 2012 London Olympics which, I’m sure, we’ll win gold: Politicking. But, wait. Wasn’t there news that we won gold last Friday? Yes we did. In the sport of wushu—which is the top advocacy in Cebu of my fellow Rotarian, Francis Onglatco—we won the top medal. Willy Wang, 21, a resident of Manila, won in a sport that had 13 nations competing. The sad part? It wasn’t counted. Wushu is an exhibition sport, which brings back memories of the 1988 Seoul Olympics when Arianne Cerdeña won “gold” in bowling. Sadly, that and this weren’t counted. I wonder why—if sports like trampoline, kayaking, and team handball are included in the Olympics (plus, a new entry in Beijing: BMX)—bowling isn’t part of the Games? Isn’t this sport of heavy balls and tenpins more popular than, say, trampoline? Or, why not billiards? Isn’t that a game played inside bars and cafes worldwide? Because if the Olympics included B & B (bowling and billiards) plus another B (pro Boxing), then, with athletes named Paeng and Bata and Django and Manny, we’re sure to clinch gold. Until then, it’s the same one prize: itlog.
