Pan Am Report - Colombia, Chile Eye More Medals in Guadalajara, London

(ATR) Colombia and Chile are two countries making concerted efforts to improve their sports programs with the results already seen at the Pan American Games and – they hope – the London Olympics next year.

While Colombia is a sports-minded country, Chile is not. Andres Botero, IOC member and former president of the Colombian Olympic Committee, and Neven Ilic, president of the Chilean Olympic Committee, tell Around the Rings about strategic plans to raise the sports profile in their countries.

Each has a goal of bettering the medal haul from the 2007 Pan Ams. In Rio de Janeiro, Colombia was sixth in the medal count with 14 gold, 20 silvers and 13 bronzes for 47 total medals. Venezuela (70) and Argentina (60) had more total medals, but fewer golds. Chile ranked 11th with 20 total medals –six gold, five silver and nine bronze.

After nine days of competition in Guadalajara, Colombia ranks seventh with 10 gold, 11 silver and 14 bronze medals for a total of 35.

Chile has 17 medals: one gold, six silver and 10 bronze. Because Dominican Republic and Guatemala have more gold medals, Chile ranks behind them in the medal count in 11th place. Only 21 of the 41 countries, plus Netherlands Antilles, have medals at this juncture.

Change in Colombia

"I think in the last few years Colombia has changed in all aspects, not only economically, but in safety and now in sports," says Botero, who was president of the NOC from 1997 until he lost the post to Baltazar Medina in March 2009.

He says Medina has continued to follow the strategic plan he set in place, "because he saw it was good," Botero says. Last year, Medellin hosted the 2010 South American Games and Colombia won the medal count for the first time, finally beating Brazil and Argentina.

"This shows the level that Colombia's gaining, and at the same time, we showed the new image of our country, of our cities," Botero says. "Colombia has changed."

Medellin has expressed interest in bidding for the 2018 Youth Olympic Games to further demonstrate the process of recovery in Colombia. Botero says his country has one of the strongest economies in South America.

Bringing in the Best

To achieve a transformation in sports, Colombia brought in professional administrators and top coaches from around the world as part of a 10-year strategic plan concluding in London. That also includes retaining top medical personnel, purchasing sports equipment and funding travel. "You must have the best if you want to be the best," Botero says.

"In life, it's like an airplane. If you take off and don't know where you're going to land, you never get anywhere. You have to say, we'll start here and we want to reach these goals."

The government, through different presidential administrations, has supported this significant investment, giving the NOC $15 million in the last few months alone.

"They have been increasing the amount because they have seen results," Botero says, "and they have seen that for the image of Colombia, it is very good."

At the Pan Ams, Colombia has about 290 athletes, an increase of about 35 over Rio, with participants in 26 of the 28 Olympic sports. The only exceptions are modern pentathlon and field hockey.

"In hockey, we've started now a development plan and I attended for the first time the modern pentathlon competition to see if we can try to do something in Colombia, so we can cover all 28 sports," Botero says.

The new Olympic sport of rugby is growing in Colombia while golf is established through athletes like PGA Tour player Camilo Villegas.

Top Facilities

"We have all the facilities," Botero says. "Especially now that we hosted the South American Games, we built maybe the most modern sporting facilities after Rio. We are a sports-minded city, and the facilities we built are not white elephants, like in many places."

Colombia also opened a WADA-accredited lab in Bogota about six years ago.

Cycling, a national sport in Colombia for many years, has already yielded nine Pan Am medals, including five golds.

After Maria Louisa Calle won the women's individual time trial, she thanked Botero for his longtime support. "And these things don't happen in one or two years," he says. "It's a process of quite a few years."

Botero sees Colombia ranking between fifth and sixth in the medals, with Venezuela and Mexico as its top competitors.

Help from Other Countries

He credits the U.S. Olympic Committee with providing help in archery and wrestling, through hosting young athletes at the Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista, Calif. Botero says the women's archery team went from "zero" to one of the best in the world.

Colombia is sharing its knowledge, too, with Chile. Two administrators including Fabio Ramirez, the sport director who implemented the strategic plan under Botero, are now working with the Chilean Olympic Committee.

Botero doesn't mind that his talent has moved south. "I feel happy because it's people that I developed, so it shows that at least we were doing something good in Colombia," he says.

Chile Forging Ahead

Ilic hopes to make the same turnaround in Chile. When he became president of the Chilean Olympic Committee eight years ago, he immediately recognized that athletes needed a better place to train. But first, he took steps to clean up the image of his NOC and to secure sponsors because he didn't want to rely only on the government.

Ilic signed six sponsors, including a bank as well as beer and mobile phone companies, which each paid about $600,000 a year.

"With this money, my first step was to develop a high-performance center to keep all the family around," he says.

The National Olympic Training Center in Santiago de Chile opened two years ago at a cost of about $10 million, with half from the government. Ilic put 42 federations and the Olympic Committee in one building, as well as a university where new trainers can be developed. The building houses volleyball, basketball, handball, futsal, weightlifting, judo, karate, taekwondo and shooting.

"With this, the sports in Chile have a new face," Ilic says. "Now we have a place to work 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and we're starting to improve a lot."

A second phase, costing $5 million and expected to open in about eight months, will provide a facility to house gymnastics, fencing and bowling. Ilic hopes this will make the center "one of the best places in the world to develop sport."

"It’s very impressive," says U.S. Olympic Committee chairman Larry Probst, who toured the center in August. "They’re very, very proud of that facility, as they should be."

Finding New Blood

The center already serves around 3,000 people per day, including small children as part of a plan to identify young talent. Ilic says larger NOCs, like the USOC, don't need to engage in programs like these.

Chile hopes to achieve good results in London in the sports of gymnastics, triathlon and archery. The lone gold so far at the Pan Ams has been a swimming championship for Kristel Kobrich in the women's 800-meter freestyle.

One hurdle is that sports is not an important part of the culture in Chile, Ilic says.

"In Brazil, in Argentina, in the United States, everybody feels sport," he says. "Chile is different. It's more difficult because we're in a country that doesn't feel like sport is something important to develop. If you see the statistics, more than 90 percent of our population don't do sport."

What do they do? "Eat," he says with a laugh.

"But we are trying."

One measure of success is an increase in the number of athletes at the Pan Ams from about 200 in Rio to 300 here in Guadalajara. "I think we are the country that has increased the most in athlete percentage," he says. "This is good for us. It's very difficult for a small country like Chile to get more places in the Pan American Games."

Despite all of this success, Ilic will only be president through London because Chilean Olympic Committee rules allow a maximum term of eight years.

He says people have asked if the rules can be changed, but it would be awkward for him to try to change them for his own benefit.

"I think we have to put good people in to maintain the development, the image, the sponsors," he says. "It's not easy."

Written and reported in Guadalajara by Karen Rosen.

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