By Neto Baptiste
President of the Antigua and Barbuda Amateur Bodybuilding & Weightlifting Federation Dave George said the organisation in short order, will present its protocols to the relevant authorities as they pursue a return to competitive bodybuilding.
Speaking on the Good morning Jojo Sports Show, George said he was pleased to learn of the planned return to competitive cricket later this year, adding that the bodybuilding federation, following the pending CAC Championships in December, will turn their attention to a return to competition.
“We are just trying to do what we need to do to get these athletes up and ready to go off to CAC, but at the right time we will definitely put something in place. I was pleasantly surprised when I heard the president of the cricket association [Leon Rodney] making reference to a proposal put forward to Cricket West Indies and by extension the Ministry of Health, so we will do what we need to do … at the end of the day we want to continue taking the sport of bodybuilding forward, but we want to do it in the proper, right and safe environment,” he said.
Last week, Cabinet announced a competitive return for cricket following what sports minister Daryll Matthew called presentations from CEO of Cricket West Indies (CWI), Johnny Greaves, and president of the national association, Leon Rodney.
A five-member national bodybuilding team is currently preparing for December’s Central American & Caribbean Championships slated for Santo Domingo where there is close to 6,000 active cases of the coronavirus.
Dave said athletes competing in Santo Domingo will do so at their own expense as the federation was unable to raise the necessary funding after it was forced to cancel its national championships due to the spread of the virus.
“From experience last year (and that’s the same place we took the CAC team last year), we took about nine athletes and a couple of officials and even if you take the officials out of the equation, the nine athletes with all expenses paid would have run us somewhere in the vicinity of $30,000, and that includes everything, all expenses paid,” he said.
Randy Christopher, Brad Benjamin, Melissa Seaforth, Dave Roacher and Shunnette Roache will all compete in Santo Domingo.
The CAC Bodybuilding Championships is scheduled to be held from 4-6 December.