Sanchez advances to 100m free semis as Watanabe, Delgaco bomb out
The 23-year-old, who a couple of years ago took on Filipino citizenship after actually representing Canada in Tokyo 2020, clocked 53.67 in her heat to qualify with the 10th fastest time and make the semifinals. That time was good enough to reset her own Philippine mark of 54.25 seconds established during the Mel Zajac Jr. International Meet in Canada earlier this year.
That effort sort of made up for the exits of judoka Kiyomi Watanabe and Joanie Delgaco of rowing even as Nesthy Petecio was scheduled to fight at presstime in the first round of boxing competition in the women’s 57-kilogram division against Jaismine Lamboria of India.
Sweden’s Sarah Sjoestroem turned in the fastest time of 52.99 seconds, with Siobhan Haughey second in 53.02 and China’s Junxuan Yang third in 53.05. Marrit Steenbergen (53.22) and Mollie O’Callaghan (53.27) round out the Top 5.
Sanchez shoots for a place in the final at 3 a.m. Wednesday in Manila.
Delgaco found the competition a little too hot to handle earlier in the day, finishing dead last in her quarterfinal race in the women’s individual sculls at Nautica St-Flat Water.
In lane six in the third quarterfinal race, Delgaco immediately fell behind and eventually clocked seven minutes and 58.30 seconds for the 2,000-meter race dominated by New Zealand’s Emma Twigg, who timed 7:26.89.
Joining the celebrated Twigg in the semifinals are Sweden’s Aurelia-Maxima Janzen (7:31.12) and Sparin’s Virginia Rivas Diaz (7:34.01).
Delgaco’s time was actually slower than the 7:55 she registered in the repechage over the weekend.
Twigg dominated early and rowed her way to the front as Delgaco was mercilessly left behind by the star-studded field, doomed to a last place finish heading into the halfway point of the race.
She will still have a chance to improve her world ranking when she participates in the classification races on Wednesday.
In judo, China’s Tang Jing demolished Watanabe early in their women’s -63-kg first round match, prevailing via an ippon at Champ-de-Mars Arena.
The Filipino-Japanese wasn’t able to get any offense going as Jing jumped at her hard right from the very beginning.
The Chinese, ranked 22nd in the world, recorded the victory at 51 seconds as Watanabe exited in the first round for the second straight edition of the Games.
In Tokyo three years ago, Watanabe was eliminated after just 38 seconds as she and Delgaco joined a handful of Filipino athletes who have been reduced to members of the small PH delegation for the remainder of their stay in Paris.
