‘Best Oceania Championships ever’

Before departing the CNMI for her native Australia, Oceania Athletics Association executive director Yvonne Mullins called the 2008 Oceania Championships held here on Saipan from June 23 to 28 as the “best ever” area championships.

“This is I think is better than anything I’ve ever been to before. It’s been the best Oceania Championships that I’ve ever had the opportunity to attend,” she said an interview during the closing rites held Saturday evening at the Minatchom Atdao Pavilion.

“The competition has been great. The LOC has just been absolutely out of this world. The local organizing committee is better than any local organizing committee I’ve ever had the opportunity to work with. They’ve been fabulous,” she added.

Mullins said Northern Marianas Athletics and the 2008 Oceania Championships organizing committee, led by Rep. Ramon Tebuteb, exceeded everyone’s expectations.

“If you’re going to run a successful Oceania Championships you should need a lot of things to go right and what happened here this week is everything went right. In a scale of 1-10, I would give the 2008 Oceania Championships a 9.9.”

The OAA executive director said her thoughts about Saipan’s hosting of the area championships is not confined to herself and other officials as the athletes also had a lot of positive things to say about the eight-day event.

“I would hope that we would be coming back here for other regional championships or something…[like] the Micronesian Games… this is a truly great [island] and we’ve just enjoyed it so much. I think it’s one of the best places in the Pacific. The hospitality here has just been out of this world and we’re loving it. I don’t know how I will be able to get the athletes into the plane the next two days because they wouldn’t want to leave,” she said.

Even Saipan’s oppressive heat and incomparable humidity turned out to be only minor annoyances for the participants of the 2008 Oceania Championships.
“Sometimes you get places that are cold—Australia and New Zealand—but we came here and it’s hot. What goes around comes around. It’s part of the challenge. It’s hot for everybody or it’s cold for everybody. It was just a great Championships event.”

For his part, NMA president and local organizing committee co-chair Kurt Barnes thanked Mullins and OAA for their positive review of Saipan’s hosting.

“We were told tonight by all the off-island officials and also Yvonne Mullins, the executive director of Oceania, that this is the greatest Oceania Championships… the best one ever. We’re all pleased with the smoothness of the Championships—the food, the housing, the competition, the results, the media. I would also like to thank all the spectators and the sponsors.”