NZ second venue to train Malaysian Sailing squad for Asian Games

LANGKAWI, Oct 13 (Bernama) -- New Zealand has been chosen second venue, after Langkawi, to serve as training ground for the national sailing squad to prepare for the Asian Games 2010 in Guangzhou, China.

Beginning next year, the training which is scheduled in stages would be held in Auckland.

This follows the appointment of New Zealander Andrew Brown as national coach for the Malaysian sailing team.

"We are using Brown's appointment as an opportunity to use the many facilities available in Auckland, which will be our second training centre.

"The training in Auckland would be scheduled in stages because most of the sailors were schooling.

"We will send three to five sailors at a time to Auckland, otherwise they will undergo training in Langkawi," National Sports Council's elite branch director Ariffin Mohd Ghani told Bernama on Tuesday.

He said this after visiting the national sailing sports complex in Pokok Asam Kuah here today, where 30 sailors both from the elite and national back-up squads underwent training.

Ariffin said he was confident that Malaysia could bag a gold in the Asian Games 2010.

In the Asian Games 2006 in Doha, Qatar, Malaysia clinched a gold and silver through Rufina Tan in the Optimist event.

Ariffin said the performance by Malaysia's young sailors in the National Optimist Championship in Hong Kong recently, also gave him the confidence because Mohammad Faizal Norizan and Nurul Izzatul Akmar Ruzaimi were adjudged overall optimists.

Prior to this, the squad was sixth in the World Sailing Championship in Niteroi, Brazil while Mohammad Faizal was the runner-up in the individual category.