Diaz Back Home With The Elusive ‘Gold'

An Olympic gold has finally reached Philippine shores, 97 years after quest after quest, expedition after expedition — from Paris in 1924 to Rio de Janeiro in 2016 — returned bearing not the prized medallion.

- Waylon Galvez

After 18 months, Hidilyn Diaz, the heroine of the country’s modern day Olympic Games campaign, is at last home.

Under normal times, she would have rode in a grand motorcade fitting a queen, with the streets lined five, even six-deep with adoring fellowmen, all eager to pay homage to the Filipino gladiator who had brought down a mighty world champion.

Instead, she and her entourage were driven from the Ninoy Aquino International Airport to the Sofitel Hotel where they will start a seven-day quarantine before an entire country could give her a collective embrace — even if not physically.

Being away for so long, it was all worth it as Diaz got what she aimed for the moment she left for overseas in late January 2020 as she captured the country’s first-ever gold medal in the Olympics.

On board Philippine Airlines flight PR 427, members of the national team that included Diaz and street skateboarding finalist Margielyn Didal arrived at around 6 p.m. at NAIA Terminal 2.

The 30-year-old Diaz flew in with Chinese head coach Gao Kaiwen, sports psychologist Dr. Karen Trinidad and Julius Naranjo, her strength and conditioning coach.

Diaz ruled the 55-kilogram category in women’s weightlifting in the Tokyo Olympics last Monday, July 26 at the Tokyo International Forum.