Nothing normal about Thomasian who put obscure virtual sport under spotlight
Jeus Yape expects life to return to the mundane.
“It’s back to normal, and I have to catch up with my academic requirements,” he said.
That means returning to University of Santo Tomas, back inside the classrooms of the Royal and Pontifical school’s Institute of Physical Education and Academics to chase grades and deadlines.
But Yape will no longer be ordinary.
As the unexpected gold medalist of Team Philippines in the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games, Yape has found his name mentioned alongside Filipino Olympic heroes Carlos Yulo and EJ Obiena.
“I’m super honored because I [just] used to watch them on TV,” Yape, who gave the country its fourth and final gold in the Games with his victory in the virtual taekwondo event, said on Monday.
If anyone needed more proof about how his status as a college student will change, they can find it in a photo of the three Filipino gold medalists in the recent Asian Games, taken during an event that gathered some of the winners of the continental showcase.
Yape, Obiena and Yulo are the three champions who produced the four gold medals won by Team Philippines in Japan.
“There was a time when I watched the Olympics and would say, ‘Oh, there is Philippines’,” he said. “I [never expected] that I would be able to talk to them and join them as among the gold medalists in the Asian Games.”
“I really looked up to them, especially Caloy because gymnastics has a close resemblance to freestyle taekwondo,” added Yape.
The 22-year-old standout actually collected two medals in the Asiad; his other was a bronze in poomsae. His golden moment was in the obscure taekwondo event, which Yape won by beating Vietnam’s Chau Ngoc Tuyet Sang in the final.
His victory also raised awareness of the new taekwondo event, in which two players do not face each other physically but instead wear virtual reality headsets and motion trackers while fighting on separate mats.
“I’m super happy that I was able to introduce [virtual taekwondo] to Filipinos who are not aware that there’s some kind of sport that can be played,” Yape said.
So how difficult is it to play virtual taekwondo?
“It’s tough to figure out because there are times that you have to find a way,” he said. “Like in the first round of one of my matches, I had a hard time because when I always go for a head kick, I didn’t know that my opponent was protecting his head. So we had to make adjustments and go for body shots.”
“And the other difficult thing is that you don’t hit anything and that no one is absorbing the impact,” he added.
For now, Yape is back to juggling national team duties with academics. But as he walks within the hallowed walls of España’s most venerable institution, nothing is ever going to be normal for the country’s newest sporting hero.
