FIJI’S Paralympic coach to the 2016 Rio Olympics Benedito Qumi is focused on gearing up his athlete for an improved performance and placing at the world’s biggest sporting carnival.
Qumi has been coaching Epeli Baleibau — the sprinter-convert-high jumper — since last September after returning from the Pacific Games in PNG last year.
Now, he said he was really focused on monitoring because Baleibau worked during the day and he did not have him for fulltime training as preferred.
But today, he added their preparations were progressing well.
“We mainly based our preparations locally but we have used the full resources of what Viti Levu has to offer. We have done a lot of training stints in the stadium and outside of the stadium — places like Colo-i-Suva, the Sand Dunes and we have done a few acclimatisation exercises at Nadovu Park in the West,” Qumi told Times Sport.
And since returning from the Dubai qualifiers in March, he said they had basically worked on building Baleibau’s basic strength, his speed, and his fitness and technique.
“And on the flip side, he is 44 years old so he is at that age category now so I’ve also gone to a lot of medical testing and stuff. For example, we got him blood tested and from the results, we just need to improve on his diet and there are medication he will need to take.
“Hopefully with all that, we are trying to improve his placing. He is placed 14th in the world and I am working to improve his performance by 10cm from what he jumped in Dubai — his current best of 1.74m.
“We are targeting 1.84m or 1.85m so we are working on that — that is his big target.”
Qumi said there was a lot of potential that Baleibau could jump that height.
“We just completed the Melanesian Games where he jumped a height of 1.75 — 1cm better than Dubai but we will be working on his techniques for the next four weeks and that should get him to the height that we are after.”
