THE Central Visayas athletes will be leaving today for the 2016 Palarong Pambansa in Legazpi City, Albay set on April 10 to 16.
The Region 7 squad, which is composed of athletes mostly from Cebu and reinforcements from Bohol and Siquijor, will travel via boat and then bus going to Legazpi City, Albay.
Dr. Luz Jandayan, chief of the Education Support Service Division (ESSD) of Department of Education (Deped) 7, said there are 466 athletes in the 715-strong Region 7 team.
Majority of these 466 athletes will take the long sea and bus trip today going to Legazpi, while some will travel by plane. The other members of the Region 7 team, especially the kitchen staff, left a day before the athletes.
“Majority of the athletes will be going with us. There are some athletes who can afford who have chosen to travel by plane,” she said. “The athletes from Danao City will also take the plane because their fare was supported by the Danao local government unit.”
The Region 7 players will be staying at the Malabog National High School and Project Impact Elementary School during the Palarong Pambansa stint.
Jandayan said that Region 7 will be joining all the 17 regular games of the elementary and secondary level. They will also join four demonstration sports and the special games for children who have special needs.
The annual sporting meet will have archery, arnis, aquatics, athletics, badminton, baseball, basketball, boxing, chess, football, gymnastics, sepak takraw, softball, table tennis, taekwondo, tennis and volleyball as regular sports. Futsal, billiards, wrestling and wushu are the demo sports. RSC
One of the main goals for Region 7 this year is to redeem itself from a sixth place finish last year, the worst finish of Region 7 in the Palarong Pambansa.
For several years, Region 7 had always been in the Top 4, except for 2013, when it improved to third place.
Jandayan said that the team is determined to improve last year’s output and as a way to prepare the athletes, the DepEd Region 7 together with the coaches monitored the training from March 14 until April 3.
She said that they count on the individual events to deliver most of the medals for Central Visayas.