KONI Unveils National Training Camp for SEA Games 2009

Niken Prathivi, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The National Sports Council (KONI) announced Thursday a decentralized training camp for preparations for the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games in Laos in December.

The camp will include 284 athletes from 20 sports, but the national archery, badminton, cycling, soccer, tennis and weight lifting federations have yet to submit their athletes' names "due to technical and administrative reasons".

KONI chairwoman Rita Subowo said the trainees were medalists at the last SEA Games in Thailand in 2007 and had good medal prospects, not just in Laos but at the following Games Jakarta will host in 2011.

The camp unveiling followed an unprecedented move last November by the State Ministry for Youth Affairs and Sports to organize a training program with a view to enhancing Indonesia's medal prospects in 2011. The Top-tier Athletic Program (TAP) features 238 athletes from 20 sports.

While the two might overlap in practice, Rita said she hoped the TAP could ease the burden in preparing athletes for multi-event showcases like the SEA Games.

"With five multi-sports events this year alone, we are glad about the PAL and hopeful it will help. Together we can train and maintain our athletes to enhance their performance at those events," she said during the inauguration ceremony of the training camp in Jakarta.

The decentralized training camp will be held in North Sumatra (water polo, wushu taulo), Riau (golf, sepak takraw, weight lifting), South Sumatra (billiards, soccer), Jakarta (badminton, track-and-field, tennis, table tennis, fin swimming), West Java (cycling, volleyball), East Java (archery, diving, swimming), East Kalimantan (shooting, karate, tae kwon do, wushu shanshou, judo, pencak silat, wrestling) and Maluku (boxing).

This year, KONI plans to participate in five multi-events. The nearest event is the 1st Asian Martial Arts Games in Bangkok from Apr. 25 to May, where Indonesia will send 39 athletes.

Training camp chief for Asian Martial Arts, Madju Daryanto Hutapea, said the 39-athlete quota would not be dominated by KONI's training camp. "The chance is open to TAP athletes. We will scrutinize athletes for both programs a month before the event," he said.

He said a qualified TAP athlete must follow a training program set by KONI.

Label: Sport