Briefings
TEAM Fiji will be holding regular press briefings as it finalises athletes’ and administrative updates for the 2016 Rio Olympics. Below are the updates by the end of this week.
Athletics
Japan-based judoka Josateki Naulu has qualified for the Olympics Games. His weight category is under 81kg.
Archery
Robert Elder is currently training overseas. He moves to Turkey later this month. Elder has shot at the qualifying rounds but he has to shoot at a recognised qualifying event, which is why later this month, he will be in Turkey to hopefully reach the qualifying round and qualify outright for Rio.
Table tennis
Sally Yee continues with her training.
She is in Australia right now with her coach, training with the team there.
Team Fiji hopes she will improve as far as her performance in Rio is concerned.
Sally is the first table tennis athlete to qualify outright for any Olympic Games in the Pacific, but excluding Australia and New Zealand.
Swimming
The Oceania swimming tournament is scheduled in two weeks.
Matelita Buadromo is in the country so she will stay on.
But Meli Malani arrives this weekend and he will be training here with the team.
It is hoped that both swimmers could meet the qualifying standards and qualify outright for Rio.
Matelita will be swimming in the 200m freestyle, while Meli will be in the 50m sprint freestyle.
Weightlifting
Potentials at this stage include Apolonia Vaivai and Eileen Cikamatana, Manueli Tulo and Mesake Raiviu.
The final athlete — the male and female athlete — will not be named until July 11.
The shadow team will be named on June 20.
Overseas training
Leslie Copeland and Banuve Tabakaucoro are training in Australia.
Neither of them have qualified outright for Rio and hoping that Leslie will be able to throw the 83m that is required. He is 0.2m short of the qualifying event.
Failing that, Team Fiji hopes to get the tripartite invitation for Banuve.
Banuve is training for his 100 and 200m events.
Both athletes will be back home for the Melanesian Athletics Championship and that’s the last qualifying event going up into Rio.
Soccer
Our soccer team played in Papua New Guinea but did not perform as well as expected in Port Moresby.
For the Rio preparations, the team will go right up to their first host city Salvador where they will be based for their first two games before they move into playing Germany in their last game.
Rugby
Both the men’s and the women’s teams march into camp at the Uprising Resort on Monday.
The Uprising Resort will be locked down from Monday until the teams depart next month.
FASANOC has paid upright for Uprising to be exclusive just for rugby preparation.
Team Fiji chef de mission Cathy Wong says if Fiji is serious about winning this gold medal, it means supporting our team with whatever means that’s available.
Shooting
Glen Kable is training in Australia, after which he will travel to the US.
From there, he will travel straight down to Rio.
Glen qualified outright for the event.
There was another athlete who qualified but because of his youth, it has been decided that he will focus on the Tokyo 2020.
Administration
As far as the administration update is concerned, Team Fiji’s backhouse team is into the final stages of their preparation — the backhouse team.
For now, travels up to and back from Rio have been finalised, and insurance cover confirmed.