AFI does away with national camps
The Athletics Federation of India (AFI) has decided to do away with its old practice of holding national camps for elite athletes in this Olympic cycle.
Instead, the AFI has announced that the athletes can now train at Sports’ Authority of India (SAI) run National Centers of Excellence and train with their chosen centres run by JSW, Reliance and few others, including Army Sports Institute in Pune.
However, AFI’s former president Adille Sumariwalla, in his new capacity as official spokesperson of the body, said the rules will be different for athletes who will run in team competitions like 4x400 metres and mixed relay events.
Citing a dope suspension of quarter miler VK Vismaya who won the individual gold at the Asian Games, Sumariwalla explained that the AFI does not want a situation where outside athletes are selected for relay teams as the country may lose a medal if they are caught in doping scandal.
“The relay teams will be in camps as they need to train together. I am making it very clear that only those athletes who train in the camp for relay teams will be selected for team events,” Sumariwalla said during a virtual conference on Wednesday.
“Individual runners can train wherever they wish to. If they are good they will be selected for the individual events. The policy will not change for relay teams, rest all others can train in centres that they want to as we will not hold camps,” he added.
Sumariwalla further informed that the AFI has set up a monitoring cell that will be tasked to keep an eye on the athletes who would be spread all over India.
