By Marlon Munroe
Guyana lost its stranglehold on the Inter-Guiana Games (IGG) Track & Field discipline when the championships concluded on March 28 at the Stade de Baduel in Cayenne, French Guiana.
When Stabroek Sport spoke to national coach Lyndon Wilson yesterday he said that the team did not perform badly. He pointed out that he was not making excuses for the team finishing second but they were some key elements that aided Suriname to rise above their former ‘whipping boys’ status in athletics.
Wilson said that he learned from his counterparts in French Guiana that the Surinamese athletes were training at the high performance training facility in Brazil with a Cuban coach while the French Guiana athletes have been competing in junior race meets in Guadeloupe and Aruba. Wilson said that he was surprised with the vast development and progress that the Surinamese have made since last year’s visit for the championships in Guyana.
According to Wilson, Guyana’s male team won ahead of Suriname and French Guiana while the ladies came in third behind Suriname and French.
Overall Suriname finished with 295 points while Guyana (241) pipped French Guiana (240) by one point. Wilson believes that the exposure that Guyana’s neighbours have benefitted from made the difference between winning and losing.
Wilson, who acknowledged that many of the athletes were first timers, and more will have to be done locally for athletics, especially when one considers that the athletes had limited preparation.
Wilson said he was told that athletes from the other teams had been encamped long before the games.
Wilson made the interesting observation that while a synthetic track will help there has to be a conscious sports plan for the athletes where mental preparation is concerned.
He also noted that while the athletes were properly prepared as individuals, as a unit time was a bug bear.
The former 800m champion said that Guyanese administrators have to move away from “backyard attitudes” when it comes to the preparation of athletes for international meets, especially when everybody seems to be moving ahead of Guyana which seems to be at a standstill or taking retrograde steps.
He insisted that there should be athletic villages for athletes where they can train. Moreover, he was told that the junior athletes, also they may not be attending school, they are given licences to participate at meets such as IGG, where athletes are required to be attending an institution of learning.
He singled out 1500m athlete Jenella Jonas who was blacklisted because she was not attending school. Further, some of the countries top junior athletes suffered the same fate just days before the games.
