Karim (second right) speaks during the press conference while (from left) Hii, Snowdan and Ong look on.
KUCHING: Sarawak will be taking an amended approach in the preparations for the next Malaysia Games (Sukma) in Johor in 2020.
Minister of Tourism, Arts, Culture, Youth and Sports Datuk Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah said more focus would be placed on sports that offer the most medals.
“We will be placing more focus on preparing our athletes especially on their mental strength and physical conditioning. We will focus more on the sports which have high potential of giving Sarawak many gold medals such as archery, weightlifting, shooting, athletics, swimming and diving.
“We will give good exposure to deserving athletes from the sports that have the potential of contributing gold medals to Sarawak,” he said in the press conference after chairing the second Sukma XIX post-mortem meeting at Stadium Negeri in Petra Jaya yesterday.
Karim was accompanied by Assistant Sports Minister Datuk Snowdan Lawan who was the Sarawak Contingent chef-de-mission for Sukma Perak, permanent secretary to the Ministry of Tourism, Arts, Culture, Youth and Sports, and Sarawak Sports Corporation CEO Dr Ong Kong Swee, who is also the Sarawak State Sports Council director.
Karim said more exposure locally or outside Sarawak would be given to potential gold medallists in the move to improve their skills and standard.
“For Sukma, we used to send wushu athletes to China for a month’s training and exposure and we also send our taekwondo athletes for exposure stints overseas,” he said.
The Asajaya assemblyman felt that rehabilitation and physiotherapy services for the athletes must also be looked into seriously.
“We have previous cases of athletes from gymnastics, martial arts and other sports who were supposed to deliver gold but were unable to recover in time from their injuries,” he pointed out.
Karim added that there was a need to use an integrated athletes management system that can facilitate the proper monitoring and all-round management of the athletes training, preparation and development, as well as a good profiling system for athletes and coaches.
“We will continue to organise Sukan Sarawak (Suksar) where we can unearth more potential athletes to be groomed for Sukma,” added Karim.
To a question, Karim admitted that the 77-gold medal target set for Sukma XIX was a bit high.
“Based on the feedback from the coaches and the performances of the athletes in various competitions, we came up with a certain figure and to push the athletes and coaches to getting more gold medals, we set a higher target,” he explained.
However, he said Sarawak would not be making the same mistake in future Sukma where realistic target of 50 or slightly more gold medals will be set. Karim also thanked the athletes, coaches, officials, sports associations, members of the media and all those involved for their contribution in Sukma XIX.
“The fourth placing finish with 47 gold medals is a good performance for Sarawak and we would like to congratulate our athletes for their high level of sportsmanship and discipline during Sukma XIX,” he said.
On the cash incentives for the medallists, Karim said it could be more or less, based on what reigning Sukma champions Terengganu are rewarding their athletes, which is RM3,000 for a gold, RM2,000 for a silver and RM1,000 for a bronze.