FOR MANY students and aspiring athletes it doesn’t get better than making it onto a team to attend the esteemed Guyana Teachers Union (GTU)/Ministry of Education (MoE) Nationals Cycling, Swimming, Track and Field Championships. The event this year will run off from November 24 to 27 at the National Stadium and other venues around the capital.
However, with challenges ranging from late starts, to bad weather, to disagreements between the GTU and the MoE – the Championships has seen its fair share of drama off the field of competition.
Of course that does nothing to dampen the spirits of the hundreds of athletes who are eagerly awaiting their chance to prove themselves to be the best in the school system. From soft rumours of “No Nationals” to talks of having the Championships split into two separate hosting for the primary school and secondary school competitions, this year’s competition is no different from the others.
However, though challenges remain, Competitions Director, Seon Bristol, says things have been improving over the years.
“I’ve been here almost a decade, from about 2005 to 2006, and within that period, we have had improvements. We have moved from the way we go about organising, in how we plan the event. This year we are trying to get as technical as possible. We are introducing new measures to bring it up to IAAF standards. We are trying to get as much standard as we can keep with the international body.” Bristol said.
Nonetheless, even Bristol admits there is still room for much improvement at Nationals. Not the least of which remains the relationship between the GTU and MoE over the organising of the event. With just a matter of weeks to go, organisers of the Championships are still now getting themselves together with the planning of the event.
“Getting the Ministry and GTU to sit down, to get common understanding about the championships, we are still working on that. This year we are now getting the plan, when the event is in November,” Bristol said.
A particular matter of contention this year was the splitting up of the competition into two separate events for the primary and the secondary schools.
“Yes, there was a group working on it, but it wasn’t confirmed until late September which we (GTU) thought wasn’t enough time. We would have separated them. We would have the primary Championships biennially, and the secondary would have been annually, but because of the short period we objected to that, because it was not fair to the primary children who had already been competing. So we decided to have one competition this year, I can’t say what happens to the next year after this,” Bristol said about the issue.
“If you were going to split the championships then you need to say all that before the sport goes to the inter-house level.”
There still also remain the conditions under which athletes are housed. For the athletes, Nationals means four days of camping out on mattresses and in hammocks, housed at a number of schools turned into ‘Games Village’, taking baths in makeshift bathrooms, all clustered together. But it is not as bad as it sounds.
Many students have come away with lifelong funny memories, and friends. Some if there are even so lucky come away with one of those sought-after medals, and of course all the bragging rights that come with it.