The Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) hopes the country will surpass its previous Asian Games performance by sending athletes to 46 of 61 calendared sports for the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou, China.
POC President Bambol Tolentino said the list was based on the PH team’s showing in the 2019 Southeast Asian Games that the country hosted where Filipino athletes won the overall championship with 119 gold medals.
“We submitted our list last Friday—the deadline—and we based our list on our effort to surpass our last achievement of four gold medals—in Jakarta—because we improved a lot in the SEA Games,” Tolentino said.
Filipino athletes will be competing in aquatics, archery, athletics, baseball, softball, men’s basketball, men’s 3x3 basketball, boxing, canoe-kayak and cycling MTB and BMX.
Also on Team Philippines’ list are dancesports’s breaking, men’s dragon boat, equestrian, fencing, men’s football, golf, artistic and rhythmic gymnastics, judo, jiu-jitsu, kurash, karate, bridge, chess, esports, xiangqi, modern pentathlon, skateboarding, rowing and men’s rugby.
Completing the list are sailing, sepaktakraw, shooting, sports climbing, squash, taekwondo, tennis, triathlon, men’s and women’s volleyball, men’s and women’s beach volleyball, weightlifting, wrestling and wushu.
Surfing president Dr. Jose Raul Canlas, who was appointed as PH team’s chief of mission, said they have already started working on the Asian Games since 2022 would be a transition year for the Philippine Sports Commission because of the elections.
“I’m coordinating with (PSC) Chairman Butch Ramirez on how we are going to go about the budget right now,” Canlas said.
The country won four gold medals in the 2018 Jakarta edition at the expense of weightlifter Hidilyn Diaz, skateboarder Margie Didal, Yuka Saso in women’s individual golf, and Saso, Bianca Pagdanganan and Lois Kaye Go in women’s team gold.
The PH team also went home with two silver and 15 bronze medals.