SOMALIA: OLYMPICS 2012 - athletes hoping to represent their country in the London Olympics train at Mogadishu's run-down stadium, the former al-Shabaab rebels headquarters
Record ID:
330803
SOMALIA: OLYMPICS 2012 - athletes hoping to represent their country in the London Olympics train at Mogadishu's run-down stadium, the former al-Shabaab rebels headquarters
- Title: SOMALIA: OLYMPICS 2012 - athletes hoping to represent their country in the London Olympics train at Mogadishu's run-down stadium, the former al-Shabaab rebels headquarters
- Date: 12th June 2012
- Summary: MOGADISHU, SOMALIA (RECENT 2012) (REUTERS) WIDE OF MOGADISHU STADIUM WITH ATHLETES TRAINING MORE OF MOGADISHU STADIUM VARIOUS OF SOMALIA ATHLETICS TEAM TRAINING MORE OF SOMALIA OLYMPIC ATHLETICS TEAM TRAINING MOGADISHU RESIDENTS WATCHING AS ATHLETES TRAIN MORE OF OLYMPIC ATHLETICS TEAM TRAINING SOMALIA OLYMPIC ATHLETICS TEAM STRETCHING (SOUNDBITE) (Somali) SOMALIA OLYMPIC ATHLETE, MOHAMED HASSAN MOHAMED, SAYING: "We face a lot of problems while training as the country is still at war. You can see how the stadium looks and cannot be compared to any international stadium around the world as it is totally destroyed. We do not have training facilities like exercise machines, our meals are not balanced. We hope the problems in our country can come to an end soon so that we can carry on training." MORE OF ATHLETES STRETCHING SOMALIA ATHLETICS TEAM COACH AHMED ALI ABIKAR GIVING INSTRUCTIONS TO ATHLETES MORE OF AHMED TALKING TO ATHLETES ATHLETES DOING STRETCHING EXERCISES (SOUNDBITE) (Somali) SOMALI NATIONAL ATHLETICS COACH, AHMED ALI ABIKAR, SAYING: "The athletes urgently need a sports medical doctor. Then they require better training facilities as well as to get a foreign trained coach to take them through training as Somali coaches are not well equipped to give proper tips. Somalia coaches are not able to travel outside the country for training as they cannot be issued with visas. Once all this is done, Somalia will be able to produce some of the finest athletes in the world." MORE OF ATHLETES STRETCHING SOMALIA OLYMPIC ATHLETICS TEAM MEMBERS JOGGING (SOUNDBITE) (Somali) SOMALIA ATHLETICS TEAM MEMBER, ZAMZAM MOHAMOUD FARAH, SAYING: "The war in our country has seriously cost the people of Somalia so many opportunities, we are grateful that we are recovering and I am happy that I will attend the London Olympic games to represent my country." SOMALIA SPRINTERS PRACTISING MOGADISHU RESIDENTS LOOKING ON AS ATHLETICS TEAM TRAIN
- Embargoed: 27th June 2012 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: Somalia
- Country: Somalia
- Topics: Sports
- Reuters ID: LVA67NZ7CYRLVNQ4YYEBCLAK9YHO
- Story Text: Training in a bullet-riddled stadium where the remains of a rocket propelled grenade lies discarded on the track's edge counts as progress for Somali Olympic hopeful Mohamed Hassan Mohamed.
A year ago, Mogadishu's Konis stadium was a base for Islamist militants and a work out meant running through the city's streets dodging gun-fire and mortar shells in one of the world's most dangerous cities.
Mohamed Hassan Mohamed is one of four Somali athletes vying for two wildcard entries the country's Olympic committee says it has been handed.
For twenty years the capital's rutted roads were the frontline in running battles between feuding warlords and later Islamist insurgents battling to overthrow a government propped up by foreign forces and cash.
The Konis stadium served as an al Shabaab rebel training camp until the al Qaeda-linked combatants fled the capital in August last year. Bullet holes pepper the stadium's concrete stands, which lie in mounds of rubble in places.
Progress, however, is relative. Somalia's Olympic bid is run on a shoestring. There are no personal trainers, no physiotherapists and no nutritionists.
"We face a lot of problems while training as the country is still at war. You can see how the stadium looks and cannot be compared to any international stadium around the world as it is totally destroyed. We do not have training facilities like exercise machines, our meals are not balanced. We hope the problems in our country can come to an end soon so that we can carry on trainin," said Somalia athlete Mohamed Hassan Mohamed.
For now, the 1,500 metre specialist trains in relative safety, unless the security forces block off the surrounding area in advance of a government delegation on the move, forcing the athletes back onto the streets.
That means competing for space with patrolling armoured troop carriers, donkey carts and mountainous piles of garbage. Roadside bombs have become a growing danger.
In April, a suicide bomber blew herself up at a ceremony in the city's national theatre, killing the popular head of Somalia's Olympic committee and at least five others.
Somalia has never won a medal in the Olympic games.
Its best performance came in 1996 when its most renowned athlete, Abdi Bile, took sixth place in 1,500 metres in Atlanta.
At the time, militia fighters in the lawless capital dubbed their machine gun-mounted pickup trucks "Abdi Biles" in a typically Somalia mark of respect for the runner's power and speed.
Somalia is not expected to announce the names of the two athletes who will compete in London until later this month. Revealing their identities earlier might endanger their lives in a country plagued by kidnappings and targeted killings.
Rarely able to travel to international meets, no Somali athlete qualified for the London games outright. The International Olympic Committee issued byes for one male and one female athlete.
"The athletes urgently need a sports medical doctor. Then they require better training facilities as well as to get a foreign trained coach to take them through training as Somali coaches are not well equipped to give proper tips," said Somali team coach, Ahmed Ali Abukar, armed with nothing more than a stopwatch.
"Somalia coaches are not able to travel outside the country for training as they cannot be issued with visas. Once all this is done, Somalia will be able to produce some of the finest athletes in the world," he continued.
Abukar earns a salary of just 150 U.S. dollars a month. That comes out of a $2,000 per month pot from the Somali Olympic Committee that pays for the four athletes' accommodation in a renovated school classroom, their food and transport costs.
A Somali Athletics Federation official says the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) had provided funding of $14,000 to run the office even though it is not enough.
Before embarking onto rigorous training, Zamzam Mahamud Farah kneels towards Mecca and prays, then takes to the hard-packed dirt track in a pair of heavy trainers, baggy tracksuit bottoms and an orange bandana.
One of two competing for the women's wildcard entry, she puts her personal best at around 58 seconds in the 400 metre sprint.
The Women's world record stands at 47.60, a gaping difference that leaves her unlikely to contest a podium finish.
"The war in our country has seriously cost the people of Somalia so many opportunities, we are grateful that we are recovering and I am happy that I will attend the London Olympic games to represent my country,"said Zanzam Mahamud Farah.
In a fractured country fighting to an end 20 years of civil conflict, a medal, though, is hardly the point.
Somalia rebels Al Shabaab, which wants to impose its harsh interpretation of sharia law, has been under pressure after relinquishing control of the capital to Africa Union troops and ceding towns to Ethiopian and Kenyan troops in southern and central Somalia.
But they have still proven capable of launching deadly high-scale guerrilla-style attacks in Mogadishu, using roadside bombs, grenade attacks and hit-and-run raids against government targets in Mogadishu.
The rebels have launched mortars at Somalia's presidential palace as well as suicide bomber blew himself up outside the gate of Villa Somalia, as the presidential palace is known. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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