On advantageous hiatus

One may think that the off-season is vacation time for most of the UAAP teams. Some squads, however, have chosen to utilize their summer break to advance and hone their skills in preparation for the upcoming UAAP season.

Beach Volleyball: Sand skirmish

First time partners Wensh Tiu and Kim Fajardo experienced their first bridesmaids finish at the 15th Metro Manila Nestea Beach Volleyball Championships, while the Lady Spikers tandem of Tiu-Fajardo yielded to the University of Santo Thomas Tigresses in the tournament finale, 21-12, 21-18.

The aforementioned Spiker tandem, however, advanced to the national finals in Boracay, together with UST and Adamson University, as part of the top three pairs representing Metro Manila.

Tiu, a transferee from De La Salle University-Dasmarinas (DLSU-D), paired with Fajardo from UST High School used to play competitive beach volleyball in their respective schools.

The newly-formed tandem, which failed to advance in the national semi-finals, showed promise in the league; Coach Ramil de Jesus is considering choosing the pair to represent the Lady Spikers in the upcoming UAAP season.

Judo: Getting there

The performance of the DLSU Judo team in the previous UAAP Judo Tournament was enough to shake the UAAP Judo community. The Men’s Team devastated its arch-rival the Ateneo Judo Team, leaving them on the 3rd spot. The team was only five points away from stealing the championship crown to UST.

The Bernales-mentored pact is unstoppable on the mats and has joined the summer leagues.

The team joined the International School of Manila (ISM) Judo Invitational Tournament, ADMU’s Hajime 2012, DLSU’s One La Salle Judo Championships and the recently concluded Philippine Nation Games held in Dumaguete where key player CJ San Pedro bagged a gold medal.

When asked for the main reason in joining the leagues last summer, Team Captain Keith Ver shared, “These are the only available tournaments during summer and we make sure that the team would join. This is for their experience and exposure.” Hindrances beyond the Judokas control, however, have stopped some of their players from training and joining the summer leagues; some Judokas had to sit through the games due to injuries.

Ver expounds, “We have a lot of great potential players. Some of them are already bagging medals within just months of training.”

Incoming sophomore Marjorie Santiago, who battled a tensioned neck-to-neck with her opponent during One La Salle Judo Tournament, is one of the Judokas’ standouts.

“Well, of course we have the defending champion UST, but we’ll make sure that we won’t underestimate other teams. We are going to be very cautious in every match of every team,” Ver said when asked about the teams that they see as threats based on the summer league results.

The DLSU Judo team had been preparing for the UAAP as early as March 2012.

Badminton: Paving their way to a victory

The DLSU Badminton team could almost taste the victory, with convincing performances by both squads during elimination.

Come final four, they lost twice. The team has been joining various leagues over the summer to prepare the Shuttlers for a comeback.

The aforementioned teams joined Duelo: Battle of Badminton Supremacy, EQUIPARCO, PBaRS Cebu Leg, and POC-PSC National Games.

When asked about the team’s main goal in joining numerous leagues, Lady Shuttler Danica San Ignacio answered, “[We want] to be exposed and improve composure in our games. Likewise, we want to simulate ourselves in competing against other players from UAAP schools that have joined the tournaments. We have rookies to attend to, in order to make them ready for the upcoming UAAP. We haven’t trained for one month this summer which will [force] us to work [harder] for UAAP.”

According to the team, Flo Lamigo and Danica San Ignacio on the Women’s Division and Ronel Estanislao and JC Clarito on the Men’s Division have shown much promise.

The team says that ADMU is a stronger contender in the women’s division while ADMU, NU, and FEU may have to battle it out with DLSU in the men’s division.

San Ignacio ends, “They can expect that we will revive our place in the UAAP. Make it to the finals again and we will not let DLSU down once more.”