Vanuatu parathletes and coaches from Luganville, Isangel and Vila are currently participating in a week long training camp as part of their readiness preparation for national and international competitions.
The July camp has been funded by the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs & Trade (DFAT) through the Pacific Aus Sports Program.
PacficAus Sports was announced by Prime Minister Morrison in 2018, as a new people-to-people initiative under the Pacific Step-up Program.
The purpose of this program is to strengthen the sporting ties between Australia and the Pacific, through a shared interest in sports.
“The very strong support of the team from the Australian High Commission here in Port Vila and the Oceania Paralympic Committee working strongly with DFAT has enabled us to access this funding to prepare us for national and international competitions. We have the National Games in Malekula in November this year and next year in 2022, the Commonwealth Games in the United Kingdom in Birmingham in September,” explained Margaret Macfarlane, VPC President.
Mary Estelle Mahuk, VPC Board Member and Programs Manager explained, “We have a program in place to identify new talent while still providing on-going training for our more experienced athletes. We are very excited about the potential of Rodney Benben, Rodney Talo (running 12.13 seconds for 100 metres!), Daniel Matal and Margaret Sahi. Margaret is a Short Stature athlete with great potential in javelin & shot put.”
VPC’s Head Coach Deni Kalenga added “This DFAT Pacific Aus Sports Program funding also allows us to continue to up-skill our coaches like Timothy Loughman and Stanley Toa. Chris Nunn High Performance Coach in Australia will join us via Zoom for a coaching session. Our paratheletes too have a VPC Coaches Career Path. Ken Kahu is showing great promise as a Javelin coach.”
Its not just about sports skills. With the DFAT funding, VPC has secured the services of Ministry of Health nutritionist Anna Silas from Vila Central Hospital to talk about healthy food and the importance to athletes of a balanced, healthy diet. Catering for the camp attendees of course is all island food. No white rice, no white bread, no sugary food, only good island kakae from the local markets!
The new para talent being identified and supported by DFAT means a strong team ready to compete, raise awareness of issues faced by people living with a disability and of course, the good health outcomes for anyone participating in sport!
(0) comments
Welcome to the discussion.
Log In
Keep it Clean. Please avoid obscene, vulgar, lewd, racist or sexually-oriented language.
PLEASE TURN OFF YOUR CAPS LOCK.
Don't Threaten. Threats of harming another person will not be tolerated.
Be Truthful. Don't knowingly lie about anyone or anything.
Be Nice. No racism, sexism or any sort of -ism that is degrading to another person.
Be Proactive. Use the 'Report' link on each comment to let us know of abusive posts.
Share with Us. We'd love to hear eyewitness accounts, the history behind an article.