The management of Rupa’z fitness centre has gone a step further to increase its reputation to Uasin Gishu County by planning an annual swimming competition event that attracted young swimmers from both public and private schools. In an interview with the press during a swimming competition held at Rupa’z swimming arena, Rupa’z Fun and Fitness Centre administrator, Linet Ochieng, said the event aimed at developing skills among young swimmers. She added the event also seeks to support the new Competency Based Curriculum (CBC) which seeks to identify specific learners’ talents. ‘We felt it right to organize a swimming gala for various schools which we have been training for quite a number of months since last year. This is just a development gala for these learners, we are trying to assess the level of skills they have reached in swimming in order to nurture their talents,’ said Ms Ochieng. ‘We have 20 schools already present, by the end of the day we will award trophies and medals to the participants and a certificate,’ she said. The facility administrator indicated that the management is looking forward to making the swimming gala an annual event adding as training goes on, they will be developing a culture of swimming for the teams. ‘We can courageously say that there is a future in swimming in the North Rift region, we have seen potential swimmers coming forth and the current kids we are training, some less than 10 years will change the swimming sector in the future in the region,’ noted Ochieng. During yesterday’s competitions, Etham School emerged the best girls’ team with 189 points with Gulab and Nova schools scoring 146 and 62 points as runners up. In the boy’s category SOS garnered 250 points to emerge the best and was followed by Etham with 133 points. Gulab took the third position with 104 points. On her part Maurine Cherono an official noted that the Fun and Fitness facility is all about refreshing and rejuvenating people, by presenting an opportunity to develop a fitness culture through gym, swimming, and relaxation which also plays a vital role in addressing mental health issues among people. In her remarks, Valentine Koech, a resident of Elgeyo Marakwet who came to cheer for the swimming gala lauded the initiative by the facility and called on residents to embrace swimming besides athletics. ‘North rift region is only known for athletics, am so impressed by this competition and want to encourage the residents of this region to also try their prowess in swimming,’ said Ms Koech. Uasin Gishu County is renowned for producing some of the best athletes in the world, earning Eldoret town the title of the City of Champions.

Source: Kenya News Agency