Supriati to race in Europe for Olympics ticket

JAKARTA (JP): Women's long-distance runner Supriati Sutono will compete in a tournament in Europe before taking part in the Asian Track and Field Championships at Senayan Madya Stadium later in July to earn a ticket to the 2000 Olympic Games.

KONI vice chairman and Olympics training director Arie Sudewo told reporters after a meeting on Wednesday that Supriati had a bigger chance of qualifying for the Olympics than the other two athletes, pole vaulter Nunung Jayadi and women's long jumper Nyoman Rae Trisandiana.

Supriati managed to surpass the Olympics time limit class B of 15:55.00 in the 5,000m when she ran for 15:54.45 in the 1998 Asian Games in Bangkok. "However, SOCOG only acknowledges the achievement produced from January 1999 to Sept. 11, 2000," he said, referring to the Sydney Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games.

Arie also said he would meet officials of the Indonesian Archery Association (Perpani) to ask the core team to participate in the 2000 Olympics in Sydney in September.

"We will meet Perpani officials tomorrow (Thursday). We want to know who will replace Purnama, either Lilies Handayani or Rosena Gelanteh," he said.

Purnama has to quit the training program for the Olympics due to pregnancy. The three other women's archers who attend the training program -- Hamdiah, Lusia Elizabeth Sumampow and I Gusti Ayuputu Wulan -- performed poorly in the 2000 National Games (PON) in Surabaya last month.

Hamdiah, who has qualified in the FITA's individual event, only managed a bronze in the Olympic version of the FITA round and a silver in the women's individual 40m range of the national round. Her teammates, Lusia and Purnama, performed better to win a gold each.

Senior archer Lilies Handayani, a former silver medalist in the team event in the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, collected three golds in the FITA round and two golds from national round for East Java. Rosena of West Java netted one gold in the FITA round and three golds in the national round.

South Korean archery coach Lee Jae-hyung said that Rusena's achievement was better than Lilies. "But we will decide in a meeting which archer will be picked up to join the training program," he said.

Arie said that there would be no selection procedure for Lilies and Rosena.

Arie said Olympics swimming qualifiers had to train at the Hilton Hotel as the Senayan pool had been polluted by soccer fans of Arema Malang.

"But the problem is that the Hilton's pool is only 48 meters long or less 2 meters than the international standard size of 50m," he said. (ivy)