Local water-sport stars urged to clean up at Games

Local water-sport stars urged to clean up at Games

JATILUHUR, West Java (JP): The Indonesian Sports Council
(KONI)'s chairman urged water-sport athletes yesterday to clean
up as many medals as possible at the SEA Games in Jakarta next
October.

Wismoyo Arismunandar was speaking at a meeting here of rowing,
sailing and water-skiing athletes and coaches.

The athletes are training hard for the Games from Oct. 11 to
Oct. 19, but the association has not yet decided how many of them
will compete at the Games.

"You have trained hard so I expect you will all win as many
medals, no matter which color," Wismoyo said. He was accompanied
on his visit to the Jatiluhur training camp by Rear Admiral Arief
Kushariadi, who is the Navy's chief and chairman of the
Indonesian Water Sports Association.

Wismoyo and Arief, who went to the camp to celebrate Idul
Fitri with the athletes, were impressed by athletes' physical
condition and considered them already fit for the SEA Games.

One of the athletes read an oath that they were fit and ready
to battle to win medals.

Wismoyo hinted that the most important thing was not the oath
but their fighting spirit. "Solidarity among the athletes is the
key to the fighting spirit and that's what you should all
possess."

Fifty-two gold medals would be up for grabs in water sports at
the Games, Arief said.

There will be 31 golds for rowing, 15 for sailing and six for
water skiing events.

"We know it is impossible to grab all 52 golds but I expect we
can grab at least most of the medals in these sports," Arief
said.

Optimistic

The Navy chief was optimistic that Indonesia could sweep all
the rowing gold medals like it did when it won all seven rowing
events at the last SEA Games in Thailand.

But he hoped that most gold medals would come from sailing and
water skiing. Indonesia took only one gold, three silvers and
three bronzes in sailing at the last Games.

Water skiing was not contested at the 1995 Games in Thailand.

"I am confident we can grab more medals from sailing and water
skiing. I would like to call on all water-sport athletes to show
solidarity," Arief said.

Rowing, sailing and water-skiing training directors told
Wismoyo and Arief yesterday about their athletes' progress and
some of the problems they faced.

Rowing trainer Soetono Goenadi said his athletes had been in
training at the camp since November. "There are now 132 athletes
in training. We expect that by the end of February another 25
will join the training program. We are concentrating on sending
our athletes to compete in three events in Australia in March,
May and June."

But Soetono said the athletes faced problems such as bad
weather, sickness and equipment and funding shortages.

"Our main concern is the equipment. We need more canoes,
kayaks, motor boats and health equipment. We would like to call
on KONI to supply this equipment," Soetono said. (lnt)