By Neto Baptiste
The Liberta Sports Club has added a “small gym” to its arsenal as the body continues to show growth even during the Covid-19 pandemic, which has negatively impacted sports on a global scale.
President of the sports club and former West Indies fast bowler Kenneth Benjamin, while speaking on the Good Morning Jojo sports show, revealed that, for the time being, the gym is reserved for players and club members only.
“We are actually just going to start with a small gym for the athletes that are part of the club, but we are working on something to get funding to build a bigger one so that maybe we could open it [to the public] but at the moment it is just going to be for preparing our athletes so that they can develop and help them to offset that gym cost,” he said.
The former West Indies player who captured 92 wickets in 26 Tests and claimed another 33 in 26 One Day International (ODI) matches, said that once properly managed, a player’s career could be extended with proper strengthening of key muscles.
“The injuries that we got were because the parts of our body that took the most of the strain, the brunt of the pressure, they weren’t strong enough. So like our lower backs, hamstrings and especially the legs and core, if we would have utilized the gym or known it would have helped, we would have been much more stronger and more prepared and that is why now you notice that the fast bowlers in particular, their careers are much longer,” he said.
The Liberta Blackhawks cricket team is Antigua and Barbuda’s most successful, having won several national titles. Apart from Benjamin, the club has also produced the likes of Hayden Walsh Jr, Rahkeem Cornwall, Wilden Cornwall and others.
The sports club is also in the process of upgrading its playing surface.
