The badminton team of the Philippine National Police (PNP) bagged the biggest number of medals in the event in the recently-concluded 2009 World Police and Fire Games held in Vancouver, Canada.

Senior Supt. Leonardo Espina, PNP spokesman, said their badminton team reaped three gold medals, five silver medals, and five bronze medals in different events wherein one of the gold medalist is a police general identified as Chief Supt. George Piano.

“This year’s event, which was noted to be the largest in its 26-year history, has 10,577 athletes comprising of firefighters, police officers, corrections officers and border guards all over the world,” said Espina.

The event was hosted by British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada from July 31 to August 9.

Piano took home the gold medal with SPO2 Emilio Adarna Jr. under the Grandmaster Men’s Double, beating fellow PNP Team Badminton Senior Superintendent Luis Saligumba and SPO4 Alfredo Dalisay who bagged the silver medal. Adarna also won the gold medal for Grandmaster Men’s Single.

Other silver medalists are SPO4 Renato Reyes under Master Men’s Single. His second silver medal came from Master’s Men double along with Superintendent Rhodel Sermonia.

PO2 Earl Paul Armas and PO3 Lalaine Gopez placed third place that entitled them to get the bronze medals under Open Men’s Single and Open Women’s Single, respectively while Senior Inspector Kristine Mae Baguio, along with PO2 Armas, also won bronze medals for Open Mixed Singles.

Espina said that they are hoping to reap more medals when the next event kicks off in 2011 in New York City.