‘We just have to repackage ourselves’

One of the main goals of the new Aquatic Sports Association of Jamaica (ASAJ) president, Lance Rochester, is to make a greater effort to reach the country’s untapped potential by increasing the opportunities and the facilities for young swimmers.

Rochester, who recently defeated Georgia Sinclair 46-7 for the post, said more can be done to give more Jamaicans proper training and development at the grassroots level for a better early start in the sport.

“We are not tapping into our potential sufficiently as a country,” Rochester told The Gleaner.

“At the grassroots level not enough Jamaicans are learning how to swim. The vast majority of Jamaicans cannot swim, and swimming is concentrated in very small areas. So we have to find a way to get out there and expose persons first at the basic level.”

He said the aim is to develop a national agenda, around their ‘learn to swim’ programme, which will encompass all the other disciplines but will have swimming at its core.

“We need to emphasise that and push all the other disciplines because this is the aquatic sports association not the swim association, and we have eight disciplines, artistic swimming, beach water polo, diving, potential high diving, open water swimming, masters swimming and water polo.

“All these sports can find Jamaicans who are talented and can contribute to success on the national stage,” he continued.

However, for athletes at the national level he hopes to develop a high-performance programme that will give Jamaican swimmers the best chance of success internationally.

“We are now in the post-Alia (Atkinson) era. She has been carrying the flag breaking world records and winning medals on the international stage. But we do have athletes on the international stage.

“Our national athletes are in training, working so hard, and to ensure we give them the best shot to develop their talent, we have to develop some form of high-performance programme.

“We can creatively put together the elements of high performance that gives the best investment to our athletes,” he said. “We want to look at the models in other countries and retrofit it to suit Jamaica in order to ensure they are getting the various elements.

“High performance is big money but it comes down to best nutritional practices, psychology, sports medicine and technology that help athletes develop the most efficient technique. So when you break it down it is much more manageable than it would appear otherwise.”

Rochester added that with proper rebranding and by demonstrating aquatics’ value proposition, they can be much more appealing to corporate Jamaica and in turn generate the funds needed to support their various programmes.

“There is so much that Jamaicans love and can buy into. We just have to repackage ourselves.

“We are working out our governance systems and there is confidence in our accountability mechanism and transparency.

“So if they can see the value and feel confident in aligning with us in terms of being partners, that will enable us to raise the funds that we need in order to invest in the athletes.

“And there is a lot more we can do (to raise (funds) at the facility (stadium pool) with advertising and so on. So we are looking to tackle it in a multipronged way,” he said.

livingston.scott@gleanerjm.com