On Wednesday the Mauke Football Association blessed the equipment for their new gym. The gym was opened with a blessing from Papa Orometua Michael Akava and the building is located near the Football Field. The equipment in the gym is a mixture of both machines and weights featuring a squat station, treadmills, pull up bars and other basic gym necessities. The total cost of the equipment and the facility is about $100,000 dollars and is part of a project run by FIFA called the ‘FIFA Forward Program’. The FIFA forward program started in May 2016. This initiative is a ‘step change’ for global development of football, in order for other member associations like CIFA to share in the success of the FIFA world cup and is also one of the most prominent programs in sports development. The program has currently been updated in January 2019 to the ‘FIFA Forward 2.0’ program and will run until December 2022.
This gym was established on the island to help in the development of Mauke’s football community and other sports to give them better facilities to train and become better as athletes all together. Mauke is not the only island that has had help from this project. Some of the other Outer Islands such as Mangaia, Atiu, Mitiaro and Aitutaki have also had equipment and transportation resources given to them. “CIFA’s goal is to have better facilities and equipment on as much of the outer islands as it can, in order to allow more exposure for Cook Islanders in the world of football”, Says CIFA president Lee Harmon.
Mauke’s Football President; Tekura Samuela-Tura would like to thank the Cook Islands Football Association President and the executive committee and general secretary Mii Piri, for applying the funds to purchase this equipment to help out the island of Mauke.
