Gymnasts set for Romanian outing

Moch. N. Kurniawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Indonesian Gymnastics Association (Persani) will send 10 young gymnasts to Romania for a two-year training camp starting next month.

Persani secretary-general Asep Sulaeman said the 10 athletes would be training under reputable Romanian coaches with a view to enhancing their medal prospects at the 2005 Southeast Asian (SEA) Games and the 2006 Asian Games.

"Romania (gymnastics federation) is very serious about our outing program. It has a reputation as one of the best countries in gymnastics," he said here on Friday.

"They have shown their concern for Indonesian gymnasts. They hope we will not falter any more in Asian or international competitions after we return home from the training," he said.

Two officials will be sent in advance to work on the preparation of the training.

"We will send them on Nov. 6. They will be there for four or five days," Asep said.

However, Asep refused to disclose the names of the athletes saying that they had yet to finalize the list with the National Sports Council (KONI).

The association has stipulated that the trainees should be under 22 years of age for men and under 17 for women.

A shortlist has been formed based on the athletes' performance at the national gymnastics championship early this year and the National Games (PON) in Palembang in September.

Asep said four cities in Romania had already been selected as the training bases. The cities are capital city Bucharest, Constanta, Baya Mare and Deva.

The Romanian outing is part of Persani's long-term development goal to send skilled athletes to participate in international tournaments.

Critics say gymnasts in Indonesia are an aging population as indicated in the recent PON where Jonathan Sianturi, 33, Sepri Haryadi, 25, Lulu Manurung, 31, and Zahari, 26, still dominated the competition.

Only few young gymnasts like Devri Chandra, 20, and M. Aldila Akbar, 22, were able to compete with their seniors to win golds in the 2004 PON.