No one’s a loser in the Olympic Games

“All Olympic athletes are winners … whether or not they get a medal,” declared Tsui Wing-hei in a letter to Hong Kong’s English-language newspaper South China Morning Post. He was referring to the recent London Games which one analyst called “arguably Britain’s greatest and most unifying moment since the end of [World War II].”

Earlier, the same paper ran a picture of the Somali-born British champion Mo Farah helping up Filipino Rene Herrera, who came last in the men’s 5,000-meter marathon. The Briton was smiling kindly as he hoisted the grinning Herrera who looked close to collapse.

The 11 Filipino athletes sent to represent their country at the London Olympics will have returned home loaded once again with souvenirs rather than trophies. Not that any of our athletes ever won any grand prizes internationally for any sport that has nothing to do with boxing. Pinoy boxers did win bronzes in the 1988 and 1992 Olympics, and a silver by Mansueto Velasco in Atlanta in 1996. This time boxer Mark Anthony Barriga crashed out early after training briefly in Wales. Why do our athletes not excel, as other Asians do, in the “less strenuous” sports like table tennis, badminton and shooting?

A Wall Street Journal sports analyst had earlier written that “the Philippines is expected to return from the Olympics empty-handed.” He’d done an overall survey of the region and also predicted that “the Southeast Asia Olympic haul is likely to be small.” His prediction was based on an analysis of interviews with experts and athletic performances in recent national and international competitions, after an actuary ran 1,000 simulations of the Games to predict the likely outcomes.

Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore had each won two medals as of this writing. Earlier, I watched enthralled the synchronized diving competition, where two Malaysian (Chinese) women ranked last; at least they made it to the finals. Indonesian and Singaporean teams have excelled in badminton and table tennis—games that Filipinos can tackle with proper training.

The Philippines doesn’t excel internationally for obvious reasons—lack of funds, of motivation and of will. Our anemic sports commission is often headed by political appointees (remember when Ferdinand Marcos appointed his nephew to head an agency, which the latter ran as a PR exercise?). With endemic poor management and corruption, underinvestment in facilities and top-level coaching, it’s small wonder we breed losers.

Once in a blue moon our athletes do well in regional tournaments, but there’s a woeful lack of foresight on the part of the government. School programs can nurture swimmers, and volleyball and table tennis players, but sports instructors are invariably untrained and unprofessional. Sorely missing is a sense of purpose on the part of the authorities to build strong bodies along with agile minds. So how can Pinoys dream of shining abroad if scant thought is given to supporting their efforts?

Furthermore, why are basketball and boxing emphasized? The latter is a violent game that, in my opinion, should be banned like bullfighting is being eventually banned in Spain. Basketball is an unfortunate legacy of our American colonialism, unlike that of the British who introduced soccer and cricket, sports more suited to the physique and temperament of the people they had colonized. Soccer builds up players’ physical agility and mental acuity and is more suited for players of smaller stature. Kicking a ball and wresting it with one’s feet from an opponent require as much skill and speed as basketball, which involves sprinting and using arms and hands to score points. The fact that large Western fellows need to be imported for our professional basketball teams to compensate for our own short and slight players shows the sports authorities’ skewed values. And hoping for more Manny Pacquiaos is useless, since that sport only brings personal riches for individuals, not the youth in general.

Sports experts who studied the Southeast Asian region of 600 million cited “poor administrative management and weak financial muscles” as reasons few succeed in global games. Rising Asian economies have not bred outstanding athletes. The only nation churning out world-class athletes is China—mainly because of its drive to display its superiority. The intense training expended on its youngsters has succeeded in turning out well-honed performers. Very young children are regimented and brainwashed in sports factories, and subjected to tortuous routines to morph them into near-robots. China’s relentless drive to show that it’s better than the West breeds this competitiveness. Communism boasts of great athletic feats to make that nation overcome its past inferior status. One result is the fact of its throwing its weight around the region, bullying its neighbors in the South China Sea.

The lack of ambition displayed by some Southeast Asian sports agencies and the fact that funding goes to regional, not global, competitions show that the authorities know their limitations and so don’t aim higher. Token teams like ours will continue to be sent to join the big extravaganzas abroad every four years. But as an advisor to the Olympic Council of Asia says, “If we cannot nurture the best young people, we will be unable to compete in the long term. With each year that passes, another group of potential athletes disappears.”

Sadly, truer words were never spoken.

Isabel Escoda is a freelance journalist based in Hong Kong.