OCM Weekly Highlight - 5 December 2010

OCM Weekly Highlights

5th December 2010

OCM Official Website: www.olympic.org.my

Coming Events

3rd World Junior Wushu Championship 2010 – 2nd to 10th December 2010 at Jurong Sports and Cultural Centre, Singapore.

47th Malaysian Table Tennis Championships 2010 – 20th to 23rd December 2010, at Dewan S.M. (C) Pay Fong, Kg. Ampat, Melaka.

18th OCM Executive Board Meeting – 21st December 2010 at 4.30 p.m. at OCM Boardroom.

14th National Olympic Academy Session for Young Sports Leaders 2011 – 25th to 30th January 2011 at Wisma OCM, Kuala Lumpur.

V Commonwealth Tenpin Bowling Championship 2011 – 19th to 26th February 2011 at Sunway Megalanes, Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia.

MAJOR SPORTS EVENTS 2010/2011

2nd Asian Beach Games Muscat 2010 – 8th to 16th December 2010, Muscat, Oman.

7th Asian Winter Games 2011, Astana-Almaty, Kazakhstan – 30th January to 6th February 2011

News Items

8h OCM-Tan Sri Alex Lee Charity Golf Tournament 2010

The 8th Tan Sri Alex Lee Charity Golf was held on 1st December 2010 at Palm Course and Bunga Raya Course of the Saujana Golf and Country Club, Subang. A total of 28 teams participated, out of which 13 were from sports and sports related organizations. Registration was at 6.45 am followed by breakfast from 7.00 am, with play starting at 8.00 am. The weather was very good and all the golfers had great fun, meeting old friends and making new ones.

On the completion of Golf, lunch was served at the Ti Chen Restaurant of the Club. Speeches were presented by YAM Tunku Tan Sri Imran ibni Almarhum Tuanku Ja’afar, President of OCM and Y.Bhg. Dato’ Thomas M.L. Lee, Chairman of the Organising Committee of the 8th OCM – Tan Sri Alex Lee Charity Golf. Presentation of prizes to the Charity Golf winners and presentation of study grants to the recipients of the Tan Sri Alex Lee Athletes’ Education Fund was then held.

The results of the Charity Golf were as follows:

• Winning Team: National Sports Council Malaysia Team
• Runner-Up: Sports Unite Team.
• Third: Malaysian Ladies Golf Association Team.
• Fourth: Team Leader
• Fifth: Team VIP

Novelty prizes were won by the following:

• Nearest to pin at Hole No. 2: Encik Wong Hung Nung – 2 ft. 3 in.
• Nearest to pin at Hole No. 16: Master Emil Bernstein – 11 ft. 3 in.
• Nearest to line at Hole No. 10: Encik Stephen Weller – 1 ft. 3 in.
• Nearest to line at Hole No. 7: Encik William Saw – 1 in.
• Longest Drive at Hole No. 13: Encik Vadivalakan – 300 yards.
• Longest Drive at Hole No. 3: Encik Nathan Hauser – 286.7 yards.

Three study grants were awarded to the following 3 national athletes:

Ms. Tan Hui Tien (DanceSport) – Born in 1992, she is presently an A Level student at TAR College, Kuala Lumpur. In 2009 she took the Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) examination and obtained 7 As. In 2009, she with her partner Johnston Lim Swie King represented Malaysia in DanceSport at the 3rd Asian Indoor Games held in Hanoi, Vietnam. She is the Malaysian Amateur Closed Standard Champion 2010, partnering Johnston Lim.

Mr. Lau Xiu Qiang (Table Tennis) – Born in 1990 in Kedah, he is presently pursuing a degree in Sports Science at the University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur. In 2008, he was the SUKMA Mixed Double Champion and in 2009 he was the National Mixed Doubles runner-up. He was the Kedah State Singles Champion for 2008 and 2009. He was a member of the Malaysian Table Tennis team in 2007 and 2008.

Ms. Chiu Soo Jiin (Table Tennis) – Born in 1985, Ms. Chui is from Sabah. She is presently pursuing a degree in Bachelor of Business at the Help University College, Kuala Lumpur. She has represented Malaysia since 2007 at the 17th and 18th Commonwealth Table Tennis Championships, the 2007 and 2009 SEA Games. In 2010, she represented Malaysia at the Delhi XIX Commonwealth Games, where the team won a Bronze medal and recently at the Guangzhou 16th Asian Games. She is the National Singles runner-up from 2007 to 2009.

The Olympic Council of Malaysia and the Organizing Committee of the 8th OCM – Tan Sri Alex Lee Charity Golf wish to thank all the sponsors, donors, supporters and the participating teams and players for their support of the Tournament. In particular, special thanks must be extended to Y.Bhg. Tan Sri Mohd Razali Abdul Rahman, Chairman of Saujana Golf & Country Club and the Management team of the Club, for their continuous strong support of the Charity Golf.

Guangzhou 16th Asian Games 2010

Congratulations to the Malaysian Contingent for the excellent performance at the Guangzhou 16th Asian Games, by achieving the target of 9 gold medals and also winning 41 medals in total. The 9 gold medals won is the highest achieved by a Malaysian Contingent in an Asian Games, while the 41 total medals won is one short of the 42 medals won 4 years ago in Doha.

Overall the performance of the Malaysian Contingent over the last 4 Asian Games has been quite consistent. Table 2 below shows the breakdown of Malaysia’s medal tally over the last 4 Asian Games from 1998 to 2010. The table shows that Malaysia has won medals from 19 sports/disciplines. The breakdown for each Games is as follows:

• 1998 won medals in 12 sports/disciplines and 5 gold medals from 4 sports/disciplines, namely Swimming, Karate (2), Snooker and Squash.
• 2002 won medals in 14 sports/disciplines and 6 gold medals from 4 sports/disciplines, namely, Tenpin Bowling (2), Karate (2), Squash and Wushu.
• 2006 won medals in 14 sports/disciplines and 8 gold medals from 5 sports, namely, Badminton, Tenpin Bowling (3), Squash (2), Sailing and Wushu.
• 2010 won medals in 13 sports/disciplines and 9 gold medals from 5 sports, namely, Tenpin Bowling (2), Cycling, Karate (2), Squash (3) and Wushu.

Squash is therefore the most successful sport, having won gold medals in all the 4 past Asian Games. Tenpin Bowling, Karate and Wushu are next, having won gold medals in 3 out of the past 4 Asian Games. Badminton, Tenpin Bowling, Equestrian, Karate, Sailing, Septaktakraw, Squash and Wushu have won medals in all past 4 Asian Games. Diving, Cycling and Snooker have won medals in 3 out of the past 4 Asian Games.

It is also clear that the main gold medal winning sports of Malaysia are non Olympic Games programme sports. With OCA restricting the number of non Olympic Games programme sports to 7, it is imperative for OCM to ensure that sports like Tenpin Bowling, Karate, Septaktakraw, Squash and Wushu are not dropped from the Incheon 2014 Asian Games programme.

At the same time, it is equally, if not more important for the National Sports Associations of sports with multiple events, such as Athletes (47 events), Shooting (44 events) and Swimming (38 events), to improve their athletes preparation and training programmes so as to increase their chances of winning at least a couple of medals. For the Guangzhou 16th Asian Games of the above three sports/disciplines, only Shooting managed to win one bronze medal. Over the past 4 Asian Games, Athletics managed to win 1 bronze medal in 1998 and 1 silver and 1 bronze medal in 2006, while Swimming won 1 gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze medal in 1998.

3rd Basic Sport Administration Course

The 3rd Basic Sport Administration Course was organised by MSNS Holdings Sdn Bhd, with the support of the Selangor State Sports Council at the Carlton Hotel, Shah Alam, from 29th November to 2nd December 2010. 16 participants from Selangor state sports association and the Selangor State Sports Council successfully completed the course and were awarded the Olympic Solidarity Certificate of the Basic Sport Administration Course.

Dr. Tan Siew Eng, Encik Aloysius Lee, Encik Wan Yew Leong, Cik Moira Tan, Encik Suhardi Alias, Encik Stanley Charles Louis and a couple more were the lecturers at the course.

International Volunteers Day

Today, 5th December is International Volunteers Day. It was therefore a timely coincidence for Ms. Rajes Paul, writing in today Sunday Star, who stated “Volunteers like Jegathesan are a dying breed in Malaysia, where we have an aging and seriously depleting number of volunteers. And those who do come to help are mostly driven by monetary returns – and not for the love of the game”.

While there is a lot of truth in the above statement, I as one of the old dinosaurs, who has served as a volunteer for the past 40 years, feel that the spirit of volunteerism in Malaysia is still strong. If Malaysia were to organise a big and glamourous sports event, such as a SEA Games or an Asian Games, in the near future, I am sure Malaysians by the thousands will volunteer their service and there will be no shortage of volunteers.

In the area of volunteers serving national and state sports organisations, there is certainly a shortage of volunteers, due to possible duplication and conflict of roles and responsibilities between volunteers and paid staff and also the increasing number of paid staff working full time in such sports organisations. However, small and less affluent sports organisations, that cannot afford to employ paid staff are still being operated by volunteers, without who, the organisation would die.

One of the main reasons for people not wishing to volunteer is because of misunderstanding and protection of one’s turf. Volunteers are the worst enemies of volunteers, because those volunteers holding attractive positions will certainly not wish to surrender or even share their positions with other volunteers. On the other hand, paid staff are no better, because they see volunteers as rivals and competitors who may take over their positions and/or their privileges.

At the Delhi XIX Commonwealth Games 2010, I came across for the first time, a distinction between paid staff (PS) and volunteers (V), which were printed quite clearly on the accreditation cards, under the category WF (Work Force). One of the volunteers stated that she was very proud of the distinction as she did not wish to be mistaken to be a paid staff.

In conclusion, sport all over the world cannot survive without sports volunteers. It is therefore important that all sports organisations and sports officials be aware of the situation and do their best to encourage more young people to serve as volunteers.

(The above are the personal views are those of Dato’ Sieh Kok Chi)

14th National Olympic Academy Session for Young Sports Leaders 2011

The 14th National Olympic Academy Session for Young Sports Leaders, organised by the National Olympic Academy of Malaysia will be held from 25th to 30th January 2011 at Wisma OCM, Jalan Hang Jebat, Kuala Lumpur. Affiliates of OCM are requested to nominate their representatives, to attend the above Session. The best Malaysian male and female participant will be selected to represent Majlis Olimpik Malaysia to attend the International Olympic Academy Session to be held in Olympia, Greece, in June/July 2011.

All members of OCM are encouraged to nominate candidates to attend the 14th National Olympic Academy Session for Young Sports Leaders 2011.

47th Malaysian Table Tennis Championships 2010

The 47th Malaysian Table Tennis Championships 2010, will be held from 20th to 23rd December 2010, at Dewan S.M. (C) Pay Fong, Kg. Ampat, Melaka. A total of 16 Men’ States teams and 13 Women’s States teams, comprising a total of about 200 players will be competing in the following 7 events, Men’s Team. Women’s Team, Men’s Singles, Women’s Singles, Men’s Doubles, Women’s Doubles, and Mixed Doubles.

OCM’s Relationship with BFM 89.9FM

Following regular contacts between OCM Media Committee (Encik Chris Syer) and BFM 89.9FM, the Radio Station has agreed to broadcast news from OCM/NSAs in their weekly programme – “Sports Un-illustrated” - hosted by Ross Yusoff on Sundays from 10.00am to 12 Noon. NSAs are requested to make contact with Encik Chris Syer, a member of the OCM Media Committee by e-mail <> or mobile 012 3895950, and provide details of up-coming events and personalities that the NSAs would like to feature on the BFM 89.9FM “Sports Un-illustrated” programme.