The UV principal, Esteban Morcillo, received last 4 July the UV sports players who will participate in the Olympic or Paralympic Games at Rio de Janeiro 2016.
The UV principal, Esteban Morcillo, received last 4 July the UV sports players who will participate in the Olympic or Paralympic Games at Rio de Janeiro 2016.
The principal received the following students: judoka Julia Figueroa (who could not be there because she had a meeting with the selection) studies Physical Therapy and will attend the Olympic Games from 5 to 21 August; Héctor Álvarez, yachtsman and student of Business Management and Direction; Héctor Cabrera, javelin thrower and student of Physical Activity and Sports Sciences; Maurice Eckhard, cyclist and student of the Master’s Degree in Physical Activity and Sports Direction and Management; who will participate in the Paralympic games from 7 to 18 September and Mónica Merenciano, judoka and student of Physical Therapy who could not attend the meeting either.
The sports players were accompanied by the vice-principal of culture and equality, Antonio Ariño; the coordinator of elite and high-performance sport players programme of the Service of Physical Education and Sports, Amparo Dols; members of the mixed committee of the UV Divina Pastora Chair for Adapted Sports: Pilar Nieto, Rosa Laparra and Miguel Ángel Torregosa, also in charge of the UV Programme of Adapted Sports; and the director of the Unit for the Integration of People with Disabilities, Celeste Asensi, among others, accompanied the principal.
During the meeting, Amparo Dols presented the different sports players within the high and elite performance programme; she presented both those who classified and those who almost made it -as in the cases of Teresa Bueso (rugby) and Ana Sanchís (cycling). Straigthaway, Miguel Ángel Torregrosa highlighted “the importance of the Divina Pastora support and the work done from the Unit, as they allow juggling studies and sports and giving attention to a collective with functional diversity which has set an example for other institutions”.
Maurice Eckhard, Paralympic cyclist, commented that he was “lucky to be one of the pioneers of the Chair, and it was an honour to be counted with and give way to such a wonderful project. When I started there was an aid for high-level sports players, but the boost achieved with the Chair allowed Paralympic players to take off and has helped us juggle studies and sports. I believe this has been a very good bet by the UV”. Héctor Álvarez, Paralympic yachtsman, explained that sailing is a very tactical and technical sport which not only depends on them but also on the wind and the waves, which makes it a very complicated sport”. The sports player thanked “the UV and the UV Divina Pastora Chair for Adapted Sports for the aids and programmes they have promoted”. He was followed by Héctor Cabrera, Paralympic javelin thrower, who also took advantage of the situation to “thank for the UV work, the facilities it has given us to juggle studies and sports, mostly at this level and in my first year of university. If it were not for this programmes, it would be very hard for us to reach our current position. The life of a high-level sports player is not healthy and takes much efforts, so the help of doctors, physiotherapists and other professionals is very important for us; these programmes help us a lot”.
The vice-principal of culture and equality, Antonio Ariño also added that “these players makes us proud, and we hope for them to keep on participating in the Olympic games and make a good reputation for themselves and the Universitat, from where we will be tracking and cheering you”.
Then, the principal thanked the attendance of Rosa Laparra and Pilar Nieto along with the implication of the Divina Pastora Chair in all programmes. He concluded the event wishing all players “the greatest success and for them to bring out the maximum of their possibilities”. Additionally, he stated his concern on the problem of doping, “they are practices we shall explain clearly because they are not good”. Likewise, he insisted on the players to “compete and enjoy the experience without obsessing about being number one”.
