RI athletics urged to focus on grassroots

RI athletics urged to focus on grassroots

Musthofid, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Indonesian Athletics Federation (PASI) should be more focused
on developing athletics at the grassroots level in a bid to
improve its overall performance, an expert said Monday.

"If you want to develop sports, in this case athletics, you
must start from the grassroots level," International Association
of Athletics Federations (IAAF) coaching expert Gunter Lange said
on the sidelines of a coaching seminar here.

The German is one of two lecturers speakers at the ten-day
seminar, organized by the Jakarta-based Regional Development
Center (RDC).

Coaches Education and Certification System (CECS) Level I
Lectures Seminar began at the RDC headquarters on Sunday and will
end March 25.

Thirteen participants from 11 of RDC's 19 member countries
members are attending the seminar, including Bangladesh, Brunei
Darussalam, Buthan, India, Laos, Maldives, Myanmar, Pakistan, Sri
Lanka, The Philippines and Indonesia.

The other lecturer is Fletcher McEwen of Australia.

"By increasing the number of qualified coaches, you will have
a big impact on the grassroots level.

"It means the first impact you will notice will be the
improvement of techniques ... improvements of performance at
youth level and juniors.

"And then after some time, the wave will reach the seniors,"
Lange, who served with PASI as an advisor from 1993 to 1998,
said.

Viewing the overall state of Indonesian athletics, Lange said
PASI should reactivate its provincial chapters.

He said competitions at national level were important to
sharpen skills.

"PASI is not only Jakarta, but all of Indonesia from Jayapura
to Aceh. The provincial chapters must be reactivated. They have
to identify problems, which are specific to each of the
provinces.

"Athletics' development is a pyramid, which means the
fundamentals are more important."

Lange said IAAF was committed to developing human resources in
developing countries.

"Our goal is to pursue qualified local lecturers, at least one
high-qualified lecturer with IAAF standards in each country."

He said sufficient availability of qualified lecturers was one
key way to boost athletics' development.

Indonesia has only one IAAF-certified lecturer: Ria
Lumintiarso, who is currently the director of RDC Jakarta.

Lange said Indonesia had another eight good lecturers but they
were hampered by poor English skills. "Ria is the only lecturer
who can speak English well," he said.

During Lange's partnership with PASI, Indonesia won seven gold
medals at the 1997 Southeast Asia (SEA) Games and one at the 1998
Asian Games through long-distance runner Supriati Sutono.

However, Indonesia was whipped by Thailand and Malaysia at the
2001 SEA Games, highlighted by a loss in the athletics'
disciplines which traditionally provided Indonesia with the bulk
of its medals.

Lange, who worked with Thailand for four years before moving
to Nepal, said the lack of facilities and an athletics' culture
had attributed to the decline of Indonesian athletics.