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Track tips for finer leap

Pillai's technical tips served as an eye-opener to athletic buffs, finds out J. R. SHRIDHARAN

PHOTO: RAJU. V.

GUIDING SPIRIT The tips came in handy for improvisation

The visit of Athletic Federation of India's (AFI) Technical Committee chairman S. P. Pillai to the city came as a boon to athletic buffs who had an opportunity to fine-tune their rules and regulations of governing the conduct of various track and field events. The veteran triple jump national champion conducted classes to the budding officials for three days educating them about rules and regulations that govern the staging of events.

Pillai said that the AFI was keen on building a reservoir of talented officials in the age group of 35 to 45 years to supervise events in the arena. "Officiating athletics is more of a job involving many electronic gadgets.

This age group is more hi-fi savvy compared to their elders. AFI is keen on grooming around 200 officials for future national and international assignments," he explained.

Pillai, who works with Directorate of Student Welfare in Agricultural University in Trivendrum, took part in various State and national meets as a triple jumper in the 70s, before bidding adieu due to a spinal injury.

Role of fairer sex

Gadgets such as photo-finish camera, Electronic Distance Measurement Gadget (EDMG), palm top, wind-gauging machines were widely in use in staging the track and field events world-over.

The seminar brought to fore the importance of time management and various new rules introduced by the federation, he said.

However, what pained Pillai was the dearth of women technical officials in the country. "There are less than a dozen women technical officials in the country. Barring veterans like Lekha Thomas, Kunjukunjamma and Vijaya, we do not have quality women officials. AFI is also planning to rope in more women to officiate the events," he added.

He said the federation was planning to organise a series of workshops and seminars all over the country from October till 2009.

As many as 200 quality officials would be selected for the 2010 Commonwealth Games to be held at New Delhi. "The selected officials will be given an opportunity to officiate the Youth Commonwealth Games, scheduled for Pune in 2008," Mr. Pillai said. Around 20 delegates attended the three-day seminar.

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