Fightin' Faingason (or why a Third World athlete's quest for glory descended into a sad case of "for God, for country, forgotten")

August 16, 2021 UPDATE: Coach Jerry Faingason recently passed away due to COVID-19 last August 13, at age 58. Rest in peace, Coach Jerry. +

Former Philippine Wrestling Team Head Coach Jerry N. Faingason (August 16, 1963 to August 16, 2021)

Coach Jerry could have been one of the country’s Olympic medalists. Under more favorable circumstances, maybe he would have won the country’s first and only Olympic gold medal. He “could’ve been a contender,” to quote the line uttered by Marlon Brando’s classic movie character, as far as winning what has become the Holy Grail of Philippine sports. (August 16, 2021 update: Female weightlifter Hidilyn Diaz finally won the country's first Olympic gold medal in the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.)

Still, non-participation in the world’s most prestigious sporting event notwithstanding, Coach Jerry Faingason’s athletic achievements are nothing to scoff at. More so that in the beginning, he had the odds stacked against him—growing up with a build unfit for one of the world's toughest sports: wrestling.

Born the seventh of eight children on the 13th of August, 1963 to a farmer and housewife in the rural town of Miag–ao, Iloilo, Jerry Faingason in his childhood was one of the thinnest in the neighborhood. His friends and classmates teased him “payoy,” short for “payatot” (thin) for his small and vulnerable frame. When he was in first year high school, one of his teachers called him “malnourished” and said that he “would be of no use to the government.” Worst of all, he was always picked on and pushed around by the neighborhood bully.

It was when his father died in his second year high school that he decided to improve his lanky physique. Having lost his protector and inspired by his idol, comedian/action star Ramon Zamora (who mimicked Bruce Lee), he committed to a stringent personal training regimen. For weeks, he woke before dawn and jogged across farms and streets, swam along the river and lifted the rocks strewn on the riverbank to improve his endurance, strength and size. He also began honing his combative skills by practicing on improvised training equipment: he tied a rubber slipper to a branch of a bamboo tree and struck repeatedly on its exposed sole like a punching pad; hung a ball of cloth up in the ceiling of a nipa hut as his target for high kicks; and played “dumog,” as the Ilonggos called pastime wrestling, on the soft earth of the riverbank with his friends. All these he accomplished in between his daily chore of tending to his family's herd of cows in the fields.

His self–taught training program eventually paid off and he developed a lean and muscular build. It also proved its functional effectiveness on the basketball court: when his pesky tormentor the neighborhood bully threw the ball at him during a game, he dodged and punched him in the jaw, knocking the bigger guy out cold.

Upon graduation from high school in 1981, at 17 years old Jerry left his hometown for Manila to seek for the proverbial “greener pastures.” He first found work as a stevedore in Valenzuela, then as a household help and carpenter’s apprentice in Marikina. On his eighth month of toil in the city, he was found and fetched by his uncle Rogelio Famatid. Mr. Famatid was a soldier–athlete of the Philippine Navy and wrestled in the 1968 and 1972 Olympics. It turned out that his uncle had been looking for him since the former heard of his arrival in the big city. Mr. Famatid, who was also then coach of the International School–Makati wrestling club, picked the young man as his personal assistant.

As personal assistant to the wrestling coach, Jerry assumed the roles of bagboy, water boy, and most significantly, sparring partner to the mostly American high school wrestlers. Early on he showed potential in the sport, beating the best wrestler in the team who also happened to be a flyweight (48 kilograms) in just three months.

In August of 1982, Jerry tried out for the Philippine team that would see action in that year’s Asian Games in India. Although he did not bag the flyweight slot, he remarkably placed fourth among twelve aspirants, in spite of his being a novice with barely a year of continuous training. Encouraged by his auspicious debut, he strongly resolved to train harder and be the best wrestler he can be and someday proudly represent the country in the Olympics—just like his uncle. On August 1983, he finally qualified for the Philippine wrestling team by winning gold in the flyweight class of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) Olympics.

The ensuing years saw Jerry successfully defend his title as the country’s top flyweight wrestler consistently. National tournament after tournament he wore the gold medal around his strained neck. Unfortunately, it was wrestling against injustices committed beyond the borders of the wrestling mat that dealt him his severest losses as an athlete.

In the 1988 Seoul Olympics, the Philippines was represented by a wrestler who was beaten by the wrestler beaten by the wrestler beaten by Jerry. Ranked no. 4, the undeserving grappler was favored by the Wrestling Association of the Philippines (WAP) officers over the most logical choice: the nation’s no. 1 flyweight and undeniably then the best pound–for–pound wrestler who was Jerry Faingason. It was no surprise that wrestler no. 4 returned empty handed. (Allegedly, the erstwhile officers dropped Jerry because he was vocal in his opposition to the former's transgressions, i.e. pocketing a huge chunk of the athletes' subsidies, favoritism, and negligence in promoting the sport.)

Frustrated but unbowed, Jerry persevered and continued to own and dominate the flyweight division. Finally, in 1990 he was picked to participate in the annual World Wrestling Championship in Tokyo. He split his matches by winning the first pair and losing the last two. He ended up 11th among more than 40 of the top wrestlers in the world. His feat was recognized as a breakthrough by local sportswriters and rightly so—with Philippine Olympic-style wrestling being underdeveloped by international standards, he was seeded at the bottom of his weight class. He was not even expected to reach the top 20. If his left shoulder was not injured in his penultimate match versus the eventual world champion, he claims he would have had a strong chance of winning his last fight and barging into the top 10.

It was in these top–level international competitions that Jerry realized how far ahead the other countries were (and still are) in the development of his chosen sport. He rues that he would have developed into a far better athlete had he been rightfully provided foreign exposure and training in the early years of his career–were it not for financial constraints and excessive politicking in Philippine sports.

He shared this conversation that transpired before the competition proper began in the 1991 World Championship in Hungary:

Mongolian wrestler: “How many did you beat in the Philippines for you to qualify here?”

Jerry Faingason: “Four.”

Mongolian wrestler: “Huh!? In Mongolia, I beat 42!”

Jerry wrestled for the Philippine team until 1998. He retired at age 35 an undefeated flyweight in the nationals for 15 years. Along the way, he won gold in the 1993 ASEAN–Oceania Cup, a bronze in the 1995 Asia–Oceania Open, and a silver each in the 1997 SEA Games and SEA Wrestling Championship during his last year of international competition. A year later, he hung up his wrestling shoes and finally bid his Olympic dream goodbye–a dream that he had a chance to achieve in 1988 when he was at the peak of his athletic prowess but bypassed by the sport’s powers that be.

In May of 2009 the new officers of WAP appointed Jerry Faingason as the head coach of the Philippine wrestling team–a position many in the association felt was long overdue. In the 24th SEA Games in Laos, December of last year, he led the Philippine wrestling team to a three gold, two silver and four bronze medal finish. It was a vast improvement to its previous performance when it did not win a single gold in the biennial games.

Jerry Faingason has revived his Olympic dream–this time as head coach–and works hard to train and inspire the new generation of national wrestlers to someday win a sweet historic first for the Filipino people.