SLA President Major General (Ret) Palitha Fernando presenting a memento to Yupun Abeykoon while admiring the Commonwealth Games Bronze Medal. Looking on are SLA Secretary, Prema Pinnawala, SLA Treasurer Shantha de Silva  (Pic by Nimalsiri Edirisinghe)

By Susil Premalal  

Sri Lanka’s Birmingham Commonwealth Games Bronze Medallist Yupun Abeykoon believes that 2023 will be a challenging one as he looks for more excellence in the upcoming international events.  

The sprint specialist underlined his plans and targets for the country and the athletic programme for 2023 during a media briefing held at the CR and FC pavilion in Longden Place.     

Abeykoon’s scheduled line-up for 2023 are the Asian Athletic Championship in Pattaya in Thailand from July 12 to 16, IAAF World Championship in Budapest, Hungary from August 19 to 27, Asian Games in Hangzhou, China from September 23 to October 8 and the Circuit Grand Prix for 2023.

Abeykoon said that he is ready to face all these challenges in 2023 and expressed his confidence of winning a couple of medals for Sri Lanka.

The media briefing was arranged following a successful discussion held at the Ministry of Sports between Sports Minister Roshan Ranasinghe and other high-ranking officials of the Ministry, Chairman of the National Sports Council Arjuna Ranatunga and his members along with the President of Sri Lanka Athletics (SLA), Major General (Ret) Palitha Fernando.     

Abeykoon is now in Sri Lanka on a short vacation and is set to return to Italy on November 20.

He further noted that it is a tough task to predict the result of a short-distance event as the outcome could change after every meet.

Abeykoon also ruled out any chances of representing a foreign country even though there are several instances of athletes being bought by top athletic nations.    

He said that his main goal is to lay a solid platform on behalf of future athletics in the country and has already started his work on developing the sport from grassroot level.

Meanwhile, Abeykoon is set to sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in the coming days with the Sports Ministry on his training facilities and about his sponsorship.

The MoU has been already prepared and it has been handed over to the Sports Minister.