Sailing legend sees potential in Malaysian yachters
By R.S.N. MURALI
KUALA TERENGGANU: Malaysian yachters will be moulded into professional skippers to lead foreign teams in international-class regattas like the America’s Cup in the near future.
Local talents have caught the eye of Monsoon Cup race advisor Datuk Peter Gilmour following superb performances in the Malaysia Match Racing held at Pulau Duyong.
International event: A passenger boat going past the participants of the Malaysian qualifier for the 2008 Monsoon Cup at Pulau Duyung in Kuala Terengganu yesterday.
Gilmour is eager to coach them.
The Malaysia Match serves as one of two qualifying regattas in the lead-up to the prestigious Monsoon Cup, which will be held at the same venue from Dec 3 to Dec 7.
The Malaysia Match saw the participation of Malaysia’s sole female skipper Nurul Aim Mohd Isa who led the Perak Sailing Team.
Gilmour said the Monsoon Cup was the best platform for the Malaysians to train as leaders and prepare to compete in the international arena.
“This is absolutely a great training ground to produce world-class skippers and I see a huge potential here,” he told The Star yesterday.
“We go step by step, first we will train the locals by letting them participate in Malaysia Cup then elevate to Monsoon Cup, eventually to Asian Qualifier, America Cup and the Olympic,” he said.
Gilmour said that the year 2012 – when the Monsoon Cup will end – would be a reasonable target to develop local talents.
He cited Ian Williams who shot to stardom after leading in last year’s Monsoon Cup.
Gilmour added that the event was expected to attract about 100,000 visitors to Terengganu.
He said the event would be broadcasted live to over 100 coun tries and that the number of viewers had increased from 671.9 million in 2005 to 1.2 billion in 2006 and 1.9 billion in 2007.
Twelve teams will take part in the five-day Monsoon Cup competition this year.
- STAR Online -
No comments:
Post a Comment