Samoa’s Shooting team at their medal ceremony – they won a silver and a bronze

By Renate Rivers

The first two days of competition at the 2011 Pacific Games started off promisingly for Samoa with a medal haul of 4 bronze and 4 silver medals.

Va’a

The first Games medal for Samoa came from the Va’a team, who won bronze in the 1500m V6 Men’s event. Team Manager Jay Schuster was satisfied with the win and proud of the honor of securing Team Samoa’s first medal, however success was bittersweet with issues that arose out of the 500m V6 event.

“The 500m event was the one we were gunning for to bring home gold. Our boys were looking really good, and had been extremely competitive throughout the heats.

“Unfortunately due to a protest from the Fijian team, we were disqualified for a minor infraction.

“The issue with this is that there was no consistency across all teams. Some teams were let through whilst others were disqualified for the same thing…that’s what was the most disheartening and we’re extremely disappointed in the unsportsmanlike behaviour of some of the athletes and biased judging of some officials.�?
Competition favorites Tahiti, took home gold for both the 1500m and 500m V6 men’s events.

“Va’a is their national sport,�? said Jay, “so for our team to really challenge them and battle it out neck and neck, it’s really showing that Samoa is a force to be reckoned with and at the end of the day it’s that respect that we all want.�?

Day two for the Va’a competition saw placings of 4^th and 5^th for Indivdual paddlers Dianna Logovii Tauvale and Mark Williams.

Bodybuilding
Gold medal hopes for our champion bodybuilders were dashed late last night with strong competition from the Tahitian and New Caledonian competitors.

A disappointed Johannes Keil, team manager, did not mince words when it came to the results.

“We should have won gold. The silver and bronze is still a good result, but we came here expecting to win gold.�?
A bout of food poisoning affected more that half the team on the day before the competition.

“It was the worst timing, because we were due for our event the very next day… I heard the Papua New Guinea bodybuilders suffered the same fate,�? said Tony Ligaliga, one of the silver medalists.

The Bodybuilding competition was a one-day event.
Silver Medals:
Tony Ligaliga in the under 80kg category
Pule Sakaio in the under 70kg category
Alex Brown in the under 90kg category

Bronze Medals:
Filipo Laulua in the under 85kg category
Sanele Mao in the over 90kg category 

Tennis
After the second day of competition, both the men’s and women’s team events are promising a nailbiting finish in the semi-finals games tomorrow.

Playing Tahiti today the women, playing in Kone – a municipality approximately four hours outside of Noumea – won their pool games 2-1, whilst the men’s team lost 1-2.

The semi-finals for the men will only get tougher when they face their New Caledonian opponents tomorrow.

Basketball
A disappointing first couple of days for the men’s and women’s teams with losses against Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Tahiti respectively.

The day before the opening game for the women’s team, two players were taken to the Village medical centre for an allergic reaction and infection. One of the players – Susanna Hicks – has been detained in hospital until the infection in her foot is cleared.

The game against Tahiti was awash with missed free throws and turnovers.

“Poor execution,�? said team coach Lake Tanielu Ah Chong.

“If we had taken care of the keys to the match, everything else would have taken care of itself…as it was, we made too many handling mistakes and very poor passing.�?

The final score was 66-48 to Tahiti, of which 40 of the French Polynesians points were attributed to the bench team and only 26 to the starters.
The men’s team have lost two games in so many days – the first loss was to Fiji then Papua New Guinea today.

The Fijians kept consistent pace and maintained a steady 7-10 point lead from the 3^rd quarter onwards. A flurry of three-pointers in the final quarter secured the Fijian win with a final score of 80-61.
The PNG game was very physical, with the impressively fit Papuans never seeming to tire and working the crowd with flamboyant ‘dunks’ and layups.
The team missed many of their free-throws and clocked 22 foul shots against PNG. The final score was 86-75.

Shooting
Team Samoa’s third discipline to produce medals was Shooting.
The double barrel individual event saw Rob Maskell bring home silver for Samoa, whilst the double barrel team event produced a bronze medal from Todd Iosefa, Fata and Eddie Pengcheng.
The single barrel individual and team events begin tomorrow.

Boxing
The first boxing events took place today with Team Samoa’s Sinapapa Sanele, Petelo Matagi and Filimaua Hala producing mixed results for Samoa.

Proving to be a popular spectator sport, the bouts were well supported by althletic contingents from Nauru, Tahiti and Samoa and attended by dignitaries such as Samoa’s Minister of Sports Magele Mauiliu and Associate Minister Tuuu Anasii Leota as well as President of the XIVth Pacific Games Pascale Bastien-Thiry.

Sinapapa fought against Nauruan Caleb Colan in the 60kg event and trailed in points throughout the three rounds. He attempted to fight back in the final round, but was unable to connect the knock-out punch to assure victory. He lost 23 points to Caleb’s 34.
Petelo’s opponent was Tahitian Mai Heiarii. Fighting in the 75kg event, the points in the first two rounds evenly placed the boxers neck and neck. However, at the start of the third and final round, Petelo was able to stun and discombobulate Mai enough for him to throw in the towel.

Filimaua’s bout against Dagagio Olanjo of Nauru did not see the end of the first round after he pummeled the Nauruan in to conceding the fight. A remarkable win considering he fought with a sprained wrist, and a fitting end to a night of boxing that left spectators of all races talking excitedly about upcoming events.

Tomorrow will be a big day for Team Samoa as the Sevens competition gets uner way. The women’s team will face-off against Guam, Tahiti and New Caledonia whilst the men’s team will play American Samoa in the late afternoon.
The official medal tally currently places Tahiti on top with 6 gold, 3 silver and 1 bronze. Second place is New Caledonia with 2 gold, 2 silver and 1 bronze. Tonga is sitting at third place with 3 gold medals from bodybuilding with Fiji currently sitting on a gold, silver and bronze for Shooting, Bodybuilding and Va’a respectively. Papua New Guinea has a gold and bronze for bodybuilding, and Samoa follows closely behind in sixth position with a seven medal haul.

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