Taekwondoins for SEAG selected at national c'ships
JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Taekwondo Association (TI) will select athletes to participate in the 2001 Kuala Lumpur Southeast Asia (SEA) Games at the LG Cup national championships, to be held in Jakarta next February.
The selected athletes will then be groomed for the World Cup in Seoul in June. The event will also be used to observe the strength of other Asian countries, to prepare national fighters for the 2002 Pusan Asian Games.
TI chairman Suharto told a media briefing in the Taekwondo Foundation office at the Korean Center on Jl. Gatot Subroto that the body preferred to have centralized training instead of decentralized, as suggested by the National Sports Council (KONI).
"It will be more efficient to have centralized training, otherwise we will experience many problems. The biggest problem is the assignment of coaches to different places. We can easily control and monitor the fighters' development with a centralized training system," he said.
"However, centralized training also has problems, especially regarding the education of athletes who are still students. But we can transfer them to the Ragunan Sports School while at the training center."
Also present at the event were executive chairman Setiawan Sukardi, secretary general Adrian Lumowa, South Korean head coach Oh Il-nam, and Kim Kwang-hyun of the Taekwondo Foundation.
Suharto also presented cash bonuses to junior fighters who recently returned from the South East Asia Taekwondo Union (SEATU) Championships in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
Indonesia sent four men and four women in eight classes. The fighters brought home two golds thanks to Emerald Margareth Dien in the women's middleweight division and Derry Darmansyah in the men's featherweight. Satrio Rahardani earned a silver in the men's flyweight and Ertina Nopianti grabbed bronze in the welterweight.
In general, Indonesia was fourth following host Vietnam, which collected nine golds, the Philippines with three golds and Malaysia with two golds and three silvers.
Coach Fadly Potu said Vietnamese athletes would be formidable opponents in Kuala Lumpur as they have shown tremendous achievements and a strong fighting spirit.
"Technically, all athletes have equal skills but the Vietnamese have an intense fighting spirit. They also seem to have matured from participation in many international tournaments," he said.
"TI wasn't disappointed with the result because we only sent half the team with junior players. Most of them have had no international experience before," Suharto commented. "On the other hand, we also kept our real strength from other SEA Games participants."
Suharto said TI would groom its juniors in three major events next year, as they are expected to be prepared for the 2004 Athens Olympic Games.
"TI is concentrating on the junior taekwondoins, whose ages range between 15 and 18 years old, so they can reach their peak performance at the next Olympics," he said.
"We can't rely on the seniors, as their golden age will be over soon. The golden age is at 22 or 23 years old for full body contact sports such as taekwondo."
In Seoul, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has decided to confirm taekwondo, South Korea's fighting sport, as an official Olympic event in 2004.
The decision came in a letter from IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch to South Korea's IOC executive board member Kim Un- yong, Kim's office said.
"I am pleased to announce that during the recent meeting of the Executive Board held from Dec. 11 to 13 in Lausanne, it has been decided to confirm taekwondo as an Olympic sport," Samaranch wrote in his letter as quoted by AFP news agency. (nvn)