KUCHING: The ‘Sarawak SUKMA Weightlifting Training Centre’ is hoped to play a crucial role in adding to the state’s chances of increasing its gold medal count in the upcoming SUKMA Games.
Minister of Tourism, Arts, Culture, Youth, and Sports Datuk Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah yesterday officiated at the opening ceremony of the training centre which took place at Crossfit Kuching, Lorong Wan Alwi here.
“This reflects our seriousness in emerging as the champion for the next SUKMA.
“Weightlifting is one of the categories that we see with a lot of potential in terms of gold medals, which is why we believe that the other states are also preparing for it,” he said during a press conference.
Karim added that in the last SUKMA, he described the state’s performance in weight lifting as unsatisfactory as Sarawak was the host state.
“We know that Pahang are strong in weight lifting as they have the facilities to train their weight lifters, which gave them an added advantage.
“Even in the last SUKMA, we could see that the other states have shown an increase in performance in weight lifting.
“Competition for the category will be stiff, but we are very confident that we can come out on top,” he said.
The minister added that the unsatisfactory performance from the state in the last SUKMA was mainly a result of late preparations and lack of proper facilities; which led to the establishment of the training centre.
“With these facilities and preperations through SUKSA (Sukan Sarawak), we hope we can produce more potential weight lifters in the state and we can groom them up,” he said, adding that he hoped the state will be able to identify more potential talent in weight lifting.
Also present during the event was Assistant Minister of Youth and Sports Snowdan Lawan.
