Today, for the first time in 5 years, primary school athletes came together at the Marion Jones Sports Complex in Belize City to compete in the National Primary School Championship. 9 to 14 year olds from every district participated in 10 different competitions. This year, the Olympic Committee sent coaches to help the young athletes develop their skills. The Director of the National Sports Council, Ritchel Dominguez, told us why he is putting such an emphasis on track and field...
Ritchell Dominguez, Dir., National Sports Council
"It hasn't been in our school program for 5 years, but this year. And the minister has pledge that he will support us in getting track up and running, because it's a very expensive sport and I think that is why they have drawn back because the other sports are much more people involved. With track it skips from different schools. So what we have to do is round them up and see where you get them together. It's a whole different than basically doing football or softball or those other programs. So I think that was one of the reasons why they just left it alone for a while. But it's here to stay now. I believe as Belizeans, we are very strong, we always have representations out of Belize and we want to bring back the representation here for someone who lives in Belize, born in Belize and we get them trained and get them into the Olympics and get them as far as we can take them when it comes to track. Because I believe and I'll say it again that track is one of our stronghold when it comes to sports."
Students represented their districts rather than specific schools, and the standouts will be considered to represent Belize at the CODICADER Games.
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