A woman of adventures is certainly an apt way to describe multi-sports athlete Lakambini “Bing” Alto-La Rocque.
She has been involved in sports at an early age, pushed and influenced by her father Bangaw Alto, with basketball as her first competitive sport in high school at Jose Abad Santos Memorial School playing in the Women’s National Collegiate Athletic Association and in college, she was in the varsity team of University of the Philippines that placed second to La Salle at one time.
And even while playing college basketball, she also competed in track and field, but the best was yet to come as she opted to go to sports rather than become a metallurgical engineer.
Her father, who was also into triathlon, got her into the same sport. Bing took to it like duck to the water, winning sprint triathlon events in UP and even making it all the way to being a member of the national triathlon team from 2000 to 2003, the same time she was into varsity basketball and track and field.
It was not her only stint with a national team, though, as she also made it to the cycling team that competed in the SEA Games in 2003 and 2005. Two years later, she donned the national colors anew in the 2007 SEAG.
But it was not the end as she continued her life in sports, this time with more adventurous disciplines as she joined the national team in the South East Asian Freediving competitions, a year after she became a free-diving instructor in Boracay, where she settled down.
Bing held the previous national record in the sport, reaching a depth of 38 meters before losing it. She is aiming to reclaim it, targetting 40 meters this time, as she has already done it in practice.
On top of this, Bing is also into kiteboarding, describing it as her fun sport, which she says she would rather be doing than teaching it, as she does with freediving.
Not bad at all for a 42-year-old mother of two and a former Bb. Pilipinas Top 12 finisher in her younger years, something that she recalled was an accidental one.
“It should have been Sandra (Araullo, her teammate and future national triathlon champion), but her agent convinced me to audition and I made it to the last 25. He encouraged me to go all the way. I was not comfortable because I get nervous before crowds,” she said.
On the question of why she chose the more demanding and adventurous disciplines, she said: “I guess it was really my father who was responsible for that, particularly in becoming a triathlete, I was still small when he enrolled me at the MILO Best. And I found out I enjoy sports. I would not have been happy being a metallurgical engineer.”
The more challenging a sport, the more Bing likes it.
“That is where I get satisfaction,” she declared.
Now that life is returning to near normal, Bing is happy that triathlon is one of the first to be back, maybe because it is outdoor and not a contact sport. She is also looking back for freediving to return so she can resume her work.
“Before the pandemic, freediving, which is already popular in Bohol, Puerto Galera and Batangas, I was teaching a lot of people, mostly foreigners, and now there is just a trickle of them going back to Boracay, but it is a matter of time I guess,” she said.
Will she be staying for good in the island Paradise of Boracay?
“I enjoy the simple life here, it is a small place with no traffic, you just walk going to practically everywhere. My only concern is for the future education of my two sons as educational opportunities are limited here. But for the meantime, I will simply enjoy our time here,” she concluded.
No argument there.
