On Friday, 2 Aug, a CLAIR Sydney staff met with Mr Simon Kent, High Performance Director of Olympic Weightlifting New Zealand. Simon is based in the Papatoetoe Olympic Weightlifting Club at South Auckland, and is dedicated to training weightlifting athletes.
From beginners to Olympic athletes, various levels of weightlifting athletes from across Oceania train at the club, and this diversity has a positive effect on the team. The club focuses on not only improving the athletes’ performances, but also developing their mental strength and sportsmanship. The club also provides youths with opportunities to try the sport, and over 900 students have tried out Olympic weightlifting for the first time at the club.
The New Zealand weightlifting national team conducted their one-week Tokyo 2020 Pre-Olympic training in Kurashiki City, a sister city of Christchurch, from 23 Aug. Simon has been to Kurashiki twice and met with Ms ITO Kaori, the Mayor of Kurashiki. He also visited a local school with athletes and had a good time with the students. Simon is keen to expand sport related exchanges between New Zealand and Japan leading up to, during, and after the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and Paralympics Games.
CLAIR Sydney will continue to support sport exchange programs between New Zealand and Japan, in addition to the sister city relationships in the two countries including Christchurch and Kurashiki.
https://www.facebook.com/PapatoetoeOlympicWeightliftingClub/
From the 3rd to the 13th of December, eight selected swimmers from the Fukuoka Swimming Association visited NSW, where they participated in joint training sessions with a local school and competed in the 2024-25 Speedo NSW Senior State Age Championships.
