MANAMA, Bahrain - PI Durden Wangkay vaulted on top of the boys' 200 meter sprint and snatched Team Philippines' third gold in the 3rd Asian Youth Games here.
The 16-year-old Filipino clocked 21.76 seconds to edge out Chao-feng Chu of Chinese Taipei in a heated race going home before an ecstatic crowd at the Isa Sports Stadium here on Saturday.
Chao clocked 21.90 seconds to settle for the silver.
It was the second gold medal for the day for the Filipinos, who now surpassed the two golds the country won during the 2013 edition of the meet in Nanjing, China.
Charlie Ratcliff earlier topped the girls' 45 kg traditional MMA at Hall 1 of the Exhibition World Bahrain.
The Grade 11 student of La Salle-Zobel savored the feeling of winning his first major international competition after winning a double gold in the 100m and 200m sprints of the 2025 Palarong Pambansa in Laoag Ilocos Norte last May.
"Sobrang sarap po sa pakiramdam na hindi lang sa Palaro ako nananalo, dito rin nananalo," said the young Filipino sprinter.
Naomi Cesar made it a splendid night for Philippine athletics as she bagged the silver in the girls' 800m run.
The 16-year-old, US-based trackster clocked 2:08.69 seconds and made a serious chase on eventual gold medalist Jinping Song in the final 100 meters but just couldn't overcome the distance of her Chinese opponent.
Photo: POC
Song's winning time is 2:07.84 seconds.
Cesar set the pace for the race, but eventually was overtaken by Song just before the halfway mark. The two then engaged in a one-on-one race heading to the finish.
"I knew it was probably going to be fast, I just wanted to put myself out there and compete to the best of my abilities," said the young Filipina. "I wanted to not go in front but try and follow and try and close as hard as I could, which I did. So pretty proud of myself."
Also competing Saturday for the country was long jumper Joel Platon, who unfortunately, failed to land a podium finish.
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