RI weight lifters seek Olympic berths

RI weight lifters seek Olympic berths

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesian weight lifters might well compete at
the 26th Olympic Games in Atlanta, if they finish in the top four
at the Asian men's weightlifting championships in April.

The championships, to be held in Yachio, about 30kms from
Tokyo, from Apr. 4 to Apr. 9, serve as the final qualifying round
for Asian lifters. They offer a total of five Olympic berths, two
for the winner and one each for those who finished second to
fourth.

Coach Harry Wibowo said yesterday that 10 weight lifters will
be prepared for the Yachio meet from March 1 at Gajah Sena,
Bogor.

Harry was speaking to reporters after meeting with National
Sports Council (KONI) chairman Wismoyo Arismunandar at his office
in Senayan yesterday.

Harry said five of them were the Indonesian gold medalists at
the 18th Southeast Asian Games in Chiang Mai, Thailand, last
December. However the names of the 10 musclemen will be
officially announced only after the formal announcement of the
association's new administration line-up tomorrow, Harry added.

To the association's dismay, Indonesia won no Olympic places
at the 67th world men's weight lifting championships in
Guangzhou, China, from Nov. 16 to Nov. 28 last year.

The Guangzhou world championships were the main Olympic
qualifying competition, in which countries whose lifters finished
first to 34th were nominated for Olympic berths.

"Based on the total lifts, we estimated that we should have
gained two berths from Guangzhou because M. Rusli and Supendi
finished 18th and 23rd in the men's 54kg," Harry said.

But the calculation proved wrong as the International Weight
lifting Federation (IWF) used a points system which credits those
finishing in the top 15.

Thus, gold medalists were awarded 16 points, silver medalists
14 points, bronze medalists 13 points etc. Based on this system,
there are 34 countries whose lifters secured a total of 208
Olympic slots in Guangzhou. Of the 34 countries, nine are Asian:
China, Japan, South Korea, Chinese Taipei, Kazakhstan,
Kirgizstan, Uzbekistan, India and Iraq.

Given that the IWF offers a total of 240 Olympic tickets,
there are still 32 berths remaining, 25 of which will be
distributed equally to countries in the five continents excluding
the 34 countries. The rest, seven berths, are wildcards.

Meanwhile, the Indonesian Taekwondo Association plans to send
16 of its athletes to Sydney in June for a pre-qualifying round
for the 13th Asian Games in Bangkok in 1989.

The association's executive director Brig. Gen. Sudarto told
The Jakarta Post yesterday that the 16 athletes, eight men and
eight women, will be selected from 26 male and 22 female athletes
from throughout Indonesia, who will train from March 1 at its
centralized training center in Cilodong, Bogor.

"We will use the Sydney meet as a tryout for the 19th
Southeast Asian Games in Jakarta," said Sudarto who also met
Wismoyo at KONI's head office yesterday. (arf)