THE ATENEO Swimming Team (FAST) reaffirmed its status as one of the strongest athletic programs of the Ateneo, with another dominant showing in the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) Swimming Tournament in Season 79. One of the strongest assets of FAST is their remarkable recruitment efforts. This year, prized recruit Jethro Chua, who has been training with the blue tankers since July 2015, has made his mark in the UAAP tournament.
Chua has been swimming for almost as long as he has been able to walk. In order to conquer a fear of drowning, Chua started to learn how to swim at three years old. It would become more than just a survival skill for the freshman, as he learned to enjoy the waters.
Despite training on and off, Chua started to swim competitively in 2006 when he was ten years old, marking the start of his swimming career. Aside from being part of the national training pool of Trace College in Los Baños, Laguna, Chua was also exposed to the rigorous training program of the Philippine Center of Excellence in Aquatic Sports (PCEAS), which catapulted him to international competitions.
In 2013, Chua donned the country’s colors in the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games where he placed fourth and the Asian Youth Games (AYG) where reached the finals and placed fifth. Chua also qualified for the Youth Olympic Games and the SEA Games in 2015, but he was not able to compete because of a limit imposed on delegates and the International Baccalaureate Exams, respectively.
After graduating from the prestigious highschool, British International School Phuket in Thailand, Chua had his sights on studying Environmental Engineering (EE) abroad. However, he abided by his parents’ wishes and stayed in the Philippines, choosing instead to take up Environment Science. Nevertheless, the Ateneo’s stellar swimming program was inevitably a deciding factor as well.
Although Chua took a gap year last year, he started to train with the Blue Eagles in July 2015, witnessing the Season 78 victory in the process. Upon making his debut in the UAAP, Chua did not seem fazed by the pressure and expectation nor was he intimidated by his record-setting teammates. “It [being a rookie] is pretty fun because I’ve trained with them before and it’s nice to be able to train with them again,”he said.
The advice veterans have to offer for a rookie like Chua, however, are invaluable. While Chua notes that coaches are mainly focused in honing the athlete’s technical skills, it is the veterans who offer words of encouragement and increase morale. “The seniors are like, ‘Jet, kung mamatay ka ah lagot ka (Jet, if you lose, you’re in trouble) . . . you have to beat that guy’,” he shares.
This competitive drive is prevalent in the entire team, whose goal according to Chua is to win all golds in the competition. Despite dominating the tourney, Chua notes that the team dropped three gold medals this year, which was a setback compared to last season where they only failed to win two golds.
The rookie’s hunger to win can be seen as a testament to the winning culture of the blue tankers. The cultivation of competitiveness can certainly be seen to have been passed on to the team’s newcomers. As for the Season 80 UAAP tournament, Jethro Chua is ambitious and determined. “[I’m looking forward to] trying to win everything again,” he said simply.
