Bayiga, Apio for US

Feb 11, 2001

CURTIS Pitman, the American coach who will prepare Uganda's national athletics team for the World Championship, has started off by connecting two sprinters to US colleges.

By James Bakama CURTIS Pitman, the American coach who will prepare Uganda's national athletics team for the World Championship, has started off by connecting two sprinters to US colleges. Pitman says Makerere College School students Justin Bayiga and Christabella Apio will be the first beneficiaries of an academics cum athletics program aimed at enrolling local talents at the Bethun Cookman College in Florida. "I can not come to Uganda to train athletes without having intentions of recruiting some of them and others at my university," said Pitman in a message to The New Vision. The teenagers will be enrolled in the September semester. He stresses education. "Education is my priority. An athlete's ability to leave my program and become a good citizen is my focus." Pitman, who starts work here in May, is a coach at the Bethune-Cookman College, which he joined after serving as head coach at the Kentucky State University. The American, Saudi Arabia's coach at the Barcelona Olympics, also coached 1972 Munich Olympics gold medallists Gerald Tinker and Thomas Jefferson. Ends

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