More international exposure will be given to members of the Philippine national men’s 4×400 team, which won one of the four gold medals for athletics in the recent 32nd Southeast Asian Games in Phnom Penh.
Among them is the 25-year-old Frederick Ramirez after he finished with a gold medal with teammates Michael del Prado, Joyme Sequita and Umajesty Williams, with a clocking of 3:07.22 in the men’s 4×400 meter relays, and a bronze medal in the 400-meter run.
Improvements in Ramirez’s performance netted for him a slot in the national selection, which will be sent to the Taipei Open Championships, slated on May 27 and 28.
“The PATAFA is assembling a selection. Ramirez is going,” said national team coach Jojo Posadas.
Philippine athletics was not able to match its five-gold medal haul in Vietnam last year, but they believe that they still had a successful campaign with four golds and two new Southeast Asian Games records.
Posadas said that giving members of the national team more exposure will prepare them for the higher level competitions in the coming months.
The Asian Athletics Championships in Pattaya, Thailand this July, and the Asian Games in Hangzhou, China are next in the pipeline for the team.
The Philippines also got its gold medal from the record-smashing campaigns of Ernest John Obiena in pole vault and Janry Ubas in long jump, and from Eric Cray, who claimed a sixth straight gold in the 200 meters hurdles.