ERNEST JOHN “EJ” OBIENA is looking at his Tokyo Olympics campaign as a stage where he would be pouring everything he’s got.
“My goal is to perform my very best during the Olympic competition,” Obiena told BusinessMirror via overseas call from his training camp in Formia, Italy, on Thursday. “And I’m focusing more on each bar set.”
Obiena’s personal best of 5.86 meters—which also stands as the Philippine record—he set while earning a silver medal in a Poland tournament in February, is still outside of the vicinity of the world and Olympic pole vault record.
Swedish-American Armand Duplantis owns the world record of 6.18 meters he set indoors in Glasgow February last year, while Obiena’s training buddy in Formia, Brazilian Braz da Silva, cleared 6.03 meters in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 for the Olympic standard.
“I’m not really aiming for any heights [whether it’s Olympic or world record],” said Obiena, who has two years left in his Electronics Engineering course at University of Santo Tomas.
The 25-year-old Obiena is expected to be in Tokyo on July 25. He will have four days of training before the men’s pole vault competition on July 30.
Obiena is one of eight Filipinos who have qualified for the Olympics so far, the others being weightlifter Hidilyn Diaz, gymnast Carlos Yulo and boxers Eumir Felix Marcial, Nesthy Petecio, Carlo Paalam and Irish Magno.
Rower Cris Nievarez was the latest to make it to Tokyo after having earned his qualification only on Monday.
Obiena, who has collected two gold, one silver and one bronze medals from his European sortie prior to the Olympics, said he has gotten more motivated as the Games draw closer.
“It’s just a couple of months away so I’m trying my very best. I have my shot, so I want to be the best one I could produce,” he said. “I want to win. That’s my main driving force that pushes me every day, killing myself in training.”
Obiena has been embedded at the World Pole Vault Training Centre in Formia since the pandemic struck last year. He and da Silva share a room and are both under the keen eyes of world renowned coach Vitaly Petrov of Ukraine.
The Olympics are nine weeks away from July 23 to August 8.