ON Sunday, the Athletics Association of Guyana (AAG) held its elections and Aubrey Hutson was elected to serve his third consecutive term as president.
In speaking to the media, Hutson called out members from his previous council for their lack of involvement and for that reason he does not give the entire council a good grade on performance. “There are few workers and the more workers come on board, it is the better it will be; but they are few people working, and more people talking. So, I would like to give us an A-grade in the future but if the same thing continues, we will continue to fail our athletes. So, I will take it as average, I will give it a C”, the AAG head expressed.
Earlier in the year, Hutson expressed the desire to have more athletes qualify for the Olympic Games and stated it would be a “bad reflection” on the tenure to send less than they did in 2016. However, when questioned on the matter only one track and field athlete has qualified to date. In 2016, four qualified.
The president said it is not a failure but rather another wake-up call for the need to develop an Elite Programme.

“We have to look back at how we finish our elite programme, how do we deal with our elite athletes, how do we get them to be up there with the rest of the world because these World Championships and Olympic Games (have) over 200 countries vying for those same positions.”
He added, “We have to find a way; do we after our junior programmes send our athletes to the USA to be in the college system which basically grinds them out and they are no good for us? There are some college athletes who came back to Guyana where their coaches tell them don’t come to this National Senior Championships, so we have those situations to deal with.”
He has the view they could copy the Jamaican formula where they don’t send their “serious athletes” to the US college system but ensure local coaches are further qualified.
“What we have to start doing is developing our coaches locally and giving them the necessary knowledge of how to deal with elite athletes, try to get a lot more clubs in the process of developing athletes. “ “We have to have a broader foundation and you will see our pyramid peak higher and will have an elite programme. I am disappointed that we didn’t have more athletes qualify for the Olympics but I don’t think it is a failure on my part I think what we need to is find that solution of getting more of them out there,” the AAG head contended.