The National Olympics Committee has adopted a comprehensive plan to develop gymnastics in the country.
NOC-K President Paul Tergat revealed the plans during a ceremony dubbed '100 days to Birmingham 2022 Launch' that took place at the KICC viewpoint in Nairobi on Tuesday.
“Gymnastics is one of the biggest summer games and we believe we can find better ways of growing the sport within our country so as to expand our medals,” Tergat said.
“We want to see to it that we grow more sports in the country and that's why we had a meeting with the president of Gymnastics International,” he added.
“We are going to engage the budding talent and facilitate them going forward.”
“We are looking forward to seeing to it that in the future, the multi-sports games will help us bag a diversity of medals at the Commonwealth Games,” Tergat said.
Tergat spoke a day after the NOCK Executive board hosted the International Gymnastics Federation President Morinari Watanabe from Japan at the NOC-K offices.
Their meeting delved into ways of helping the country to set up structures for grassroots mobilization of gymnasts.
Secretary-general Francis Mutuku said they would need sufficient time to secure the technical support needed to grow the sport to its maturity.
“We are training our sights on the Dakar 2026 Youth Olympic Games and the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games. We can confidently say we will be able to have Team Kenya participating in these games,” Mutuku said.
Meanwhile, Tergat said they have already begun to lay the ground for preparations ahead of the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games slated for July. He said it was imperative for Team Kenya to report to camp at least three months earlier.
“We are in a very important part of the preparation especially now that we have started the countdown. We want to proceed to camp as soon as possible. We need to have at least three months for preparations,” Tergat said.
“As we go forward as the national Olympics committee we want to ensure that we give every athlete in the country an opportunity in terms of qualifications to get a slot in the national team.”
“That's why we are here. At the end of the day as a country when we see our athletes representing us, it inspires us, it inspires the nation.”
Tergat said the country would send participants in 17 different disciplines.
“ I encourage all sponsors and thank them for the level of support they have given us and we promise to bring excellent results.”
Tuesday's launch was graced by Deputy President Waithaka Kioni, Mutuku, deputy treasurer John Ogolla, Athletes' representative Humphrey Kayange, and member, Winnie Kamau.
Among the teams that attended the event included the Kenya Judo team, the National Boxing team and the Tae Kwondo team.
