President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) is expecting Indonesian sport climbing athletes to win gold medals at the 2024 Paris Olympics, chairperson of the Indonesian Sport Climbing Federation (FPTI), Yenny Wahid, has said.
The President stated the target while meeting several FPTI officials and athletes at the State Palace here on Wednesday.
According to Wahid, the meeting was a form of special attention from the Head of State, who has provided adequate support for the development of the sport so far.
“The President, certainly, has always paid special attention to sport climbing. He appealed to us that the achievement should not stop here (at the 2024 Paris Olympics), but it must continue,” she remarked.
At the 2024 Paris Olympics, sport climbers will vie for four gold medals in the men’s boulder & lead, women’s boulder & lead, men’s speed, and women’s speed events.
The men’s speed event has become one of the strengths of the Indonesian sport climbing contingent.
The contingent bagged all the medals in the men’s speed event at the International Federation of Sport Climbing (IFSC) World Cup Series Seoul 2022 in South Korea on May 6–8.
Currently, Indonesia’s Kiromal Katibin holds the world record in speed climbing with a time of 5.009 seconds, which he achieved in the qualification round for the IFSC World Cup Series Chamonix 2022 in France on July 8.
Meanwhile, regarding the lead event, Wahid said that FPTI is striving to carry out long-term athlete fostering to improve Indonesia’s achievements in the event.
“The target (of the lead event athletes) is to qualify for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics,” she added.
Currently, Indonesian athletes have succeeded in improving their ranking from 100 to 40 in the event, she noted.
Hence, FPTI is continuing to work to improve the athletes’ performance in the lead event so that they can continue to excel — with the long-term target of emerging as the world’s top three.
Thus, the chairperson of the association has also asked the Indonesian people to support the athletes, including at the IFSC World Cup Series Jakarta 2022, which will be held at Sudirman Central Business District (SCBD) Lot 16-17, Jakarta, on September 24–26.
“It will be open to the public, thus anyone can attend (the tournament) to support our athletes,” she said.
During their meeting, she also conveyed FPTI’s readiness to host the world cup series to the President.
Source: Antara News