Why we should plan early, identify, develop youth talent

It was refreshing to see the Ministry of Sports and the National Olympic Committee of Kenya (NOC-K) fold their sleeves in the last few weeks to put together final touches to the plans for Team Kenya's participation in the Commonwealth Games and the Africa Youth Games to be held later in August.

This is against a backdrop of the Tokyo Games last year, which was the best-funded Team Kenya in terms of preparation.

Teams were in camp longer than any other time. Previously, we've had teams going into camp as late as two to three weeks to departure.

Last year, our teams were in camp months and months in advance, and some did get an opportunity to camp for a couple of weeks in Japan awaiting the opening ceremony to ensure that they were acclimatised. Thanks to the Ministry of Sports.

Early preparations have been one of the areas that we haven't done very well in, inevitably contributing to our poor performance and increasing our reliance on athletics for medals.

However, we must commend the Ministry of Sports and NOC-K for following through on their promise to go straight into the Commonwealth Games planning right after the Tokyo Games, and especially for the emphasis on the Africa Youth Games scheduled for August this year.

While the next couple of years are sure to be jam-packed with multi-sport games, from last year's Tokyo 2020 Olympics to the Commonwealth Games just a year later and the 13th African Games in Ghana next year, followed by the Paris 2024 Games, it is easy for federations, NOCK and Government to get caught up in events mode, planning logistics, and how teams will travel.

While these are all very important, they should not come at the expense of actual team preparations. And this is where the Africa Youth Games comes in.

The games presents a great opportunity to identify and put into camp 13 to 15-year-old athletes to not only participate in Cairo later in the year, but also form part of the squad being nurtured and prepared for the 2032 Brisbane Olympic Games.

This kind of forward thinking and preparing teams two or three Olympic Games in advance will propel our supremacy as a home of champions and move our medal dependence from athletics to the other sports.

The Youth Games will also provide a good opportunity to tap into talent focus on the future generation. It was worth noting that towards the end of last year, countries that we look up to in terms of performance and medal haul, like the United Kingdom and Australia, both released record amounts to the Olympic Organising Committees for the Paris 2024 Games, which are two years away.

Federations have the primary role of running development programmes and bear the biggest burden in changing how teams are prepared.

They need to adopt a longer planning and budgeting cycle to cover two to three Olympic Games before government can step in.

Each federation needs a development and high performance unit that is not bogged down in the Commonwealth and Africa Games preparation to start focusing on Paris 2024, Los Angeles 2028 and Brisbane 2032.

It's paramount that we are looking at the high-performance talent so as to build a pool of new athletes and reduce our over-reliance on just a few athletes some of whom are beyond competing ages.

We should start looking at the next crop of athletes to emerge in Paris and then again in 2028 in Los Angeles.

We need ask ourselves, where is Malkia Strikers squad to Los Angeles 2028 Games, or Rugby Sevens team to Brisbane 2032?

How will they not only qualify but win medals? If the youth teams are not known today, we may qualify but we can forget winning any medals.

Peter Gacheru is a sports marketing specialist and CEO at IMG Kenya Limited