*441. Kapampangan-Canadian KAYLA SANCHEZ: World Class Swimmer

MAKING A SPLASH. Kayla Noelle Sanchez, 5'7" seventeener, sank 2 junior world swimming records in 2 years. She is a member of Team Canada for the2018 Commonwealth Games. Her father, Noel Sanchez, comes from Mabalacat but worked in Singapore where Kayla was born.

Promising Olympic hopeful, Kayla Noelle Sanchez is a young, versatile star swimmer currently making waves in the world of competitive swimming. Just seventeen, she has re-written 3 World Junior Swimming Records (2 in 50m. and 1 in 25m. pool)  in just two years, named to Canada’s 2018 Commonwealth Games where she collected a medal,  and garnered 2 more at the Pan Pacific Games in Tokyo, Japan.

Just as exciting to know is that Sanchez, is part-Kapampangan, one of two daughters of Noel Sison Sanchez of Dau, Mabalacat, Pampanga and Ma. Susana Pramoso, a nurse from Baguio. The couple used to be overseas workers based in Singapore, and it was there that Kayla was born on 7 April 2001.

In 2002, when Kayla was just a year old, the Sanchezes migrated to Canada. Few years later, she joined the community learn- to-swim programs and became so proficient that she reached a level where she could no longer advance at her age. Her coach advised her to join competitive swim club.

Prior to that, as a Grade 3 student, she tried out and made the school swim team and competed for the first time at the Annual Catholic District Board Swimming Championship. Shortly after, she joined a competitive swim club, and immediately, she made waves at the pool. At the short course Ontario Provincial Championships in 2014, she reset four Canadian age-group records. The most impressive was her victory in 50m freestyle which broke the Canadian age-group record of 26.34 that has been standing since 1985. Kayla went below that at 26.29 secs.

Sanchez continued to swim for the High Performance Centre–Ontario under the tutelage of Ben Titley, Canada’s Olympic swim coach. She was swimming superbly, in disciplines that included freestyle, backstroke, individual medley and the relays. In July 2017, she was part of the Canadian swim that went to World Aquatics Championship in Budapest, where they placed 4^th. She had just turned 16.

A month later, the 6th FINA World Junior Swimming Championships unfolded in Indianapolis, and once again, Canada was ably represented in the 4 x 200 meter freestyle relay by its women’s team led by Rio Olympic gold medalist Penny Oleksiak, Rebecca Smith, Taylor Ruck and Kayla Sanchez. The team not only scooped up the Gold Medal, but established a new World Junior Record  of 7:51.47, almost six seconds ahead of Russia and faster than any team of teenagers in history.

Just as 2018 was about to end, at the North York Aquatic Cup held in Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre , the teenage sensation broke the short course 50 meter freestyle World Junior Record with a blistering time of 23. 94 seconds. The previous record of 24.00 secs. was achieved by Menghui Zhu of China (Japanese swimmer Rikako Ikee finished 23.95 seconds in 2017, but this has not been ratified, and even if it were, Kayla's time is still one one hundredth of a second faster).

With her clocking, Kayla swam the 5^th fastest 50 freestyle in the world this 2018,  behind the fastest women sprinters in the pool, topped by Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom’s 23.21 seconds. This, she accomplished while still a junior age swimmer. As if this was not incredible enough, Kayla  returned later and swam the preliminary 100m backstroke in 58.2 secs., the only one to swim the distance under 1 minute.

As she is poised to enter her college years, where she is ranked #1 in college recruiting class 2019, Kayla has been receiving overtures from the best colleges and universities in the USA,  dangling scholarship offers for her to be on on their NCAA team. Her parents have taught her the permanent value of education and so, even while she was swimming, she continues to do well  in school. She graduated elementary as a class valedictorian.

Her parents are hoping in the future that Kayla will be able to swim for the Philippines. But at the moment,  an official in the Philippines National Team put it this way, “whatever flag she represent, for me she’s always be a Filipino by heart.”

SOURCES

KAYLA SANCHEZ BREAKS FOUR AGE-GROUP RECORDS AT ONTARIO PROVINCIAL CHAMPIONSHIPS, https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:ACjm1zrtjGUJ:https://swimswam.com/kayla-sanchez-breaks-four-age-group-records-ontario-provincial-championships/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ph

Kayla Sanchez’Athlete’s Profile:

https://results.gc2018.com/en/swimming/athlete-profile-n6022733-kayla-sanchez.htm

CANADA’S KAYLA SANCHEZ BREAKS WORLD JUNIOR RECORD IN 50 FREE.

https://swimswam.com/canadas-kayla-sanchez-breaks-world-junior-record-in-50-free/

https://www.swimming.ca/en/swimmer/kayla-sanchez/

https://www.collegeswimming.com/swimmer/488811/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kayla_Sanchez

MANY THANKS TO Messrs. CLARO SANCHEZ JR. & NOEL SANCHEZ

*432. THE MORALESES OF MABALACAT

DON QUINTIN MORALES, was the first of the Moraleses to hold an important office in Mabalacat. he was elected teniente del barrio of Poblacion. His younger brother, Feliciano, is the great-grandfather of Mayor Marino "Boking" Morales". 

Morales is a top-of-mind name associated with the political history of Mabalacat. And of the Moraleses that have served Mabalacat in different capacities through the years, one name stands out,  not so  much for the quality of leadership but for his longevity of tenure—Mayor Marino "Boking" Morales whose 22 years in office makes him the longest-serving mayor of the Philippines.

But before Mayor Boking, there have been a few Morales forebears who have rendered their services to the municipality of Mabalacat, in different capacities. The Morales clan could trace its beginnings to the patriarch, Mariano Morales who married Agustina Tuazon, possibly in the 1830s. The Morales couple, known members of the town principalia,  begat four children, all boys—Quintin (b.1856/d. 31 Oct. 1928), Feliciano, Valentin and Simeon (b. 4 Jul, 1880/d.24 Oct. 1942).

Quintin, the eldest son, married Paula Guzman y Cosme (b.1851/d. 7 Mar 1943,  and during the Spanish times, became a teniente del barrio (or cabeza de barangay) of Poblacion, where he and his wife settled. Quintin is buried somewhere in the sacristy of the Divine Grace Church. Of the couple’s 5 children, the youngest, Atty. Rafael Morales (b. 24 Oct. 1893/d.1967), would also venture into politics—he was elected as consejal (councilor) for two terms, during the Commonwealth years, under the mayoralties of Dr. Jose T. Garcia (1932-35) and Jose Mendoza (1940-41).

Younger brother Valentin Morales was elected teniente mayor of Sapang Bato, also during the Spanish colonial period; the youngest, Simeon, and his descendants, did not seem to show any political ambitions.

Feliciano’s son with Juana Pantig, Miguel Morales, would bring the Morales political family tradition to a higher, more prominent profile. The U.S.T. medical graduate would rise from being a medico de sanidad (department health head) of Apalit to becoming the first elected mayor of Mabalacat after the Liberation (1948-1951). As chief executive, he was responsible for building the wooden Morales Bridge, which provided the vital link between Sta. Ines and Poblacion. Mayor Morales also organized the first hydroelectric power plant, later operated by the Tiglaos. He was at the forefront of a campaign against the rising Huk movement when he was assassinated in 1951.

But it was his grandson, Marino (son of Ignacio), who would set his name on record books for a much different and unusual accomplishment. First elected mayor in June 1995, Morales began his term while Mabalacat was still reeling from the Pinatubo aftermath. He managed to extend his term through legal technicalities, strange twists of luck and with much help from election law wiz, Atty Romulo Macalintal . Amazingly, Morales would be re-elected in 1998, 2001, 2004, 2007 and 2010 elections.

When Mabalacat became a component city, Morales  filed yet again another certificate of candidacy. He was qualified to run, he said, because the status of Mabalacat had changed from that of a town into a city. Once again, amidst protests, he won the May 2016 elections. But on August 2016,  the disqualification protest filed by losing candidate Pyra Lucas resulted in Comelec First Division’s granting of her petition.  This was finally affirmed on 30 May 2017 by Comelec en banc whch ruled that the First Division’s cancellation of Morales’ certificate of candidacy was valid.

It looks like the incredible political career of Boking Morales---which had withstood charges of corruption, vote-buying and ballot-burning, familial discords, several changes in marital partners, and most recently, inclusion in Duterte’s list of narco-politicians—is finally coming to an end, at least for now. But the pool of Moraleses waiting in the wings to take on his mantle is wide and deep. Possible successors include son Dwight ( a councilor); daughter Marjorie Morales-Sambo (she once declared her bid to unseat her father); and of course, his current wife Nina, whom he initially fielded in the 2016 mayoralty race.

Morales may be down, but not out—not yet. As this article is being written, he can still resort to a few legal remedies--a temporary restraining order is one. Besides, there is still the world-record of Hilmar Moore to beat—the mega-mayor of Richmond, Texas who served his town from 1949 until his death in 2012---an epic run of 63 years! If he does that, Mabalacat may as well be renamed as Morales City, Pampanga.