UAAP Season 77 Women’s Track and Field Day 3 Recap

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Competitiveness pushed everybody to still perform at a high level despite the wet weather conditions for day three. The day featured records being smashed in the track events and with the University of Santo Tomas (UST) extending their lead after having an aggregate total of 19 medals after the third day.

Track Events

As expected, Jennyrose Rosales of the University of the East (UE) reigned supreme in the 400m qualifying rounds. She is the defending women’s 400m dash champion so all eyes were on her from start to finish. Rosales ranked first in the qualifying round with a time of 54.82 seconds.

Schoolmate and 800m gold medalist Neslee Angco ranked second in the heats with a time of 57.30 seconds – around 3 seconds slower than Rosales. Other qualifiers were Marylyn Avila of Far Eastern University (FEU) who ranked third with a time of 58.76 seconds and Michelle Loterte of UST in rank four with a time of 59.37 seconds.

Immediately after the 400m qualifying rounds were the finals of the women’s 3,000m racewalk. Krisha Sardenia of UST took home the gold medal with a time of 17:13.48. Sardenia finally had her payback as she beat UE’s Marygene Dagasdas who beat her during day one in the 5,000m racewalk. It was an exciting battle for silver between Dagasdas and UST’s Jenelyn Surdilla. However, Dagasdas managed to edge out Surdilla. Dagasdas finished with a time of 17:24.33 to grab the silver medal while Surdilla clocked 17:25.50 to take the bronze medal. These top three finishers were the only ones who clocked a sub-18 minute race.

One hour after the 3,000m walk came the finals of the 400m dash. All eyes were on Rosales who ran in lane three. From gun start, Rosales already ran away from the competition and clocked a time of 54.45 seconds – a new UAAP record. Rosales beat her own record of 54.65 seconds set during last year’s UAAP. Schoolmate Angco finished in silver medal position with a time of 56.52 seconds – more than two seconds slower than Rosales.

The second to the last event of the evening was the women’s 4x100m relay. Although Rosales and Angco proved to be the sprint dynamic duo of the competition, UST’s Denuyo, Loterte, Salcedo, and Luzon dominated the track and set a new UAAP record of 47.35 seconds. They smashed FEU’s record of 47.91 seconds.

This dominant UST relay team was about 1.6 seconds faster than silver medalists DLSU composed of Angel Carino, Leah Creer, Mary Diesto, and Judy Ann Rendora. DLSU finished with a time of 48.91 seconds.

Taking the bronze medal was UE with Rosales, Angco, Peralita Jra Ynot, and Jean Merdred Galicia. UE finished with a time of 49.01 seconds. They were exactly a second faster than fourth place finisher ADMU that was composed of Tricia Severino, Georgia Martelino, Vanessa Baguiwet, and Kimberly Zulueta.

Zulueta’s anchor leg managed to chase down the relay teams of the University of the Philippines (51.11 seconds) and Adamson University (51.78 seconds).

Heptathlon

Day three featured the first four events of the women’s heptathlon which are the 100m hurdles, high jump, shot put, and 200m dash.

Marianne Audrey Yorac of UP dominated the 100m hurdles with a time of 15.24 seconds catapulting her into first place after the first event. FEU’s Jee-Ann Racoma trailed by a close second after clocking 15.71 seconds.

Come the high jump however, Yorac pulled away by over 200 points from the competition with a 1.49m jump. Racoma lost her second place position to UST’s Chairy Palermo who scored after jumping 1.55m which was the second best of the afternoon.

In the last two events, Yorac still continued to dominate with a 7.02m throw in the shot put and a 27.04 second run in the 200m. She ended with 2,464 points after the first four events.

Trailing Yorac was UST’s Sarah Dequinan with 2,410 points. Dequinan ran a massive 200m clocking 26.21 seconds.

Coming in third palce was UST’s Palermo who threw 7.10m in the shot put and ran a 26.55 second 200m.

The competition was tight as three other women scored more than 2100 points. The 2100+ points club included FEU’s Racoma with 2,161 points in fourth place, FEU’s Jinny Rose Omena with 2,145 points, and DLSU’s Shaira Hernandez with 2,137 points.

Field Events

First up in the field events was the women’s pole vault. The strong field consisted of defending champion Katrina Baron from UP.

However, Baron only managed to record a vault of 2.80m – over 0.40 m short of last year’s gold medal finish. She would have easily won the gold medal had she jumped her 3.20m vault from last year. Taking this year’s gold medal was Rechelle Mae Abotalmo of UST with a vault of 3.10m. UST’s Sarah Dequinan and FEU’s Kristie Kaye Vinco both jumped 3.00m. Dequinan was awarded the silver medal because Vinco registered more fouls.

In the women’s discus throw, ADMU’s Baguiwet ranked first in the qualifying rounds with a throw of 32.10m. However, she was also juggling the discus throw with the women’s heptathlon. Come the finals, she skipped her first attempt and then fouled her last two attempts. She finished eighth overall with her qualifying throw of 32.10m.

UE’s Reah Joy Sumalpong capitalized on this situation and hurled the discus throw to a 35.77m distance – catapulting her into the gold medal position. UST’s Aira Teodosio was over a meter short of beating Sumalpong with a throw of 34.33m which was good enough for a silver medal. Javelin throw champion Evalyn Palabrica of FEU settled for the bronze medal with a throw of 34.04m – just 0.29m short of the silver medal.

Medal Tally after Day 3

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