Sports council cancels biomechanic tests

JAKARTA (JP): The economic turmoil has prompted the National Sports Council's 13th Asian Games task force to cancel plans for athletes to take biomechanic tests in Singapore.

Task force chairman Muhammad Hindarto told reporters yesterday that the tests would have cost the council Rp 170 million (US$12,365).

"We have to be more efficient with the budget. The Singapore Sports Medicine Institute director, Dr. Teh Kong Chuan, suggested we send two sports science experts, who understand the subject well, to be trained for one week at the institute," he said.

"Singapore was very impressed with our success in staging the 19th SEA Games last year and will give us free-of-charge training in the name of friendship. We only have to fund the transportation and board and lodging," he added.

The council has announced it will only send sports with the potential to win golds or silvers to the Asiad, which offers 377 golds. They are badminton, beach volleyball, boxing, cycling, karate, shooting, tae kwon do, tennis, weightlifting, windsurfing and wushu.

Hindarto said both experts would be trained next month after the Idul Fitri holiday.

The task force plans to test only weightlifters, shuttlers, karatekas, tennis players, boxers and windsurfers -- who are considered to have the most gold medal-winning potential -- using three simple video cameras set at 50 frames per second.

"In Singapore, they use cameras with 300 frames per second and the equipment for analyzing the biomechanic tests costs US$500,000," Hindarto said.

"Both experts will accompany coaches during the analysis to weed out the athletes' imperfections. We can record their speed, power, endurance and agility so we can train them more effectively and more efficiently," he said. (yan)