Cycling SA President William Newman and General Manager Mike Bradley attended the South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee’s (SASCOC) General Meeting on Saturday 13 April.
The meeting was the first to be held in the new Olympic cycle and there was observably a large focus on the Road to Rio 2016.
SASCOC expressed their focus on the OPEX (Operation Excellence) programme, which is centred on the athlete, further highlighting the necessity to be considering what is best for the athlete at all times. The OPEX programme and coaching for gold is the top priority as we all continue to Rio 2016.
In support of the athlete, SASCOC’s bursary fund has been in place to assist those dedicating their time to competing in sport, the ability to further their studies as well.
It was also acknowledged that the sporting codes face adversity, the main hurdle being funding. It is no different for cycling. Various steps will be taken by SASCOC to assist in alleviating this, particularly by engaging with Lotto and liaising with all stakeholders to strengthen support. A further meeting with all 52 districts will be facilitated by SASCOC in June to ascertain how they will assist the sporting codes with their efforts.
The sport federations were advised to have a clear focus on broad base development and transformation in all the provinces, and to report on a more frequent basis back to SASCOC providing relevant information that they require to measure the performance of the efforts.
Strict criteria have been laid down by SASCOC forcing every federation, on an annual basis, to be re-evaluated and those that fall short of the criteria will not be granted membership by SASCOC and will not receive any funding.
Furthermore, SASCOC will verify annual submissions ensuring that each federation’s objectives are met. Cycling SA has acknowledged the need to ensure that transformation as well as development growth is far reaching across all regions as stipulated by SASCOC.
Newman said: “Cycling SA met the SASCOC reapplication criteria for 2013 and have been ranked in the top tier 1 category, illustrating the sound corporate governance and healthy state of the Federation. No doubt there is a lot of work to be done with Transformation and Development and I urge all affiliates to work hard in assisting us achieving our objectives of broadening the base of our sport and reaching all communities. Club development is the key to developing our sport as well as having a special focus on promoting the sport at school level. I encourage you all to inform the office of all your current development initiatives.
Our success is measured by what we achieve on the sporting front so we will continue to support our riders at the High Performance level to ensure that they can deliver the results we all aspire to.”
