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is in Belize for the next 2 days. Hicks who is also a motivational speaker and a coach in the US will be meeting with sport coordinators and track athletes over the weekend. His trip is to help develop the athletic program for Belize which he plans to work closely with the Belize Sports Council. Today a press briefing was held and 7news was there.

Corey Hicks
"First of all I would just like to thank you. This is an excellent opportunity to be able to come here first of all just to access and see just the many opportunities you have here in the City of Belize. One of the things that I really and truly like is that we had the opportunity to go by the track and the track is definite top-notch track. I was sharing with the Minister that that particular track was the same track that Flo Joe set the world wide record on it in Indiana. It's a very fact track. It opens up the door for many opportunities. I am very excited to be here just to see the many talented youth that I see walking around. The key thing is about putting individuals in a position to be successful and when you put then in a position to be successful it opens up many doors of opportunities whether it is the opportunity to go to the states or go to a school. We don't necessarily know what those opportunities are but the resource and the foundation has to be established before any of that can occur."

"My goal is truly and really to have an opportunity to access and see what is the best way that we can go about laying a foundation of structure, bringing in the key individuals. In terms of resources in terms of orthopedic physicians such as strengthening condition in coaches, such as nutritionist - a whole group of individuals that I utilize back in the states again to be able to lend my resources also here to the City of Belize to really and truly help cultivate and grow this youth program. This is the foundation of structure to again so many great opportunities. Academics and sports ties hand in hand. If you have any individual and they are talented, in sports, the same talent and the same assertiveness that you apply in terms of being successful in sports is the same thing that you apply from an educational component. When these two tie and go hand in hand and basically opens up the door to get some of the youth off the streets that truly don't have a sense of direction or purpose this track foundation or establishment can really give individuals a vision."

Hon. Herman Longsworth
"We are very appreciative of him choosing to come to Belize and choosing to assist us with whatever he can assist us with in terms of developing our athletics program here. I want to say very briefly that this is in keeping with the policy to do the very best it can to bring the very best opportunities to our athletes at home. We must do it and we must start somewhere. We can't keep talking about these things, we must get in and do the best we can to make things move and this is one initiative that we are looking to try to Belize implement and see how it goes. I am confident from all the conversations that I have had with Corey that this is going to take us a long way in developing the athletics program for Belize and developing our athletes who are interested in athletics."

Hicks will be meeting with track athletes tomorrow at the Marion Jones Stadium at 9am.