Socga donates equipment to SYA and SAF |01 February 2022

SYA chairman Bristol (right) accepts part of the equipment from Mr Gopal

The Seychelles Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association yesterday donated sailing and track and field athletics equipment to the Seychelles Yachting Association and Seychelles Athletics Federation.

The buoys, sky surfs (two), pump with pressure gauge among some other accessories worth R37,000 will be used to facilitate Seychelles Yachting Association’s (SYA) training programme, especially with the pool of kite surfers on Praslin.

As for the Seychelles Athletics Federation (SAF), the spike shoes, uniform, cones among other training equipment, worth R33,000, will be donated to the different SAF-affiliated athletic clubs for their training programmes.

It was Seychelles Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association (Socga) president Antonio Gopal who presented the equipment to SYA chairman Michel Bristol and SAF representative Mervin Bonnelame, in a small ceremony, held yesterday afternoon at the Olympic House, Roche Caiman.

Present were executive members of Socga and representatives of SYA and SAF.

Mr Gopal said it is always a pleasure for Socga to help sports associations and federations since they always use the equipment given to them properly.

Mr Bonnelame said the equipment has come at an opportune time given the fact clubs through the federations have a pool of young athletes who are training to become future high level athletes.

He added that the equipment will also motivate the coaches to push harder to train and to encourage young athletes to join the sport.

He thanked Socga for the donation.

For his part, Mr Bristol thanked Socga for making available funds to purchase the equipment for the association’s training and racing competitions.

He said that kite surfing is getting more popular among the youths, especially among the youths on Praslin and the equipment will be of great benefit to them as they will surely be vying for medals in the future.

Patrick Joubert