KUALA LUMPUR: Cindy Ong is a high-performance swimming coach who has over 30 swimmers under her guidance but does not have a proper, permanent location to conduct her training sessions.
She has shifted her classes over four different swimming pools within the Klang Valley over the last three years due to various reasons.
Her predicament is not uncommon among professional swimming coaches in the country and is an issue which needs to be resolved if Malaysian swimming is to rebuild its reputation after suffering poor results at recent editions of the Sea Games.
Cindy, whose swimmers have impressed in their respective age categories in recent seasons, hopes the sporting authorities can help her find a permanent solution.
"Initially I held my training sessions at a condominium pool but we had to move out due to the regulations there which limits access for non-residents," said Cindy when contacted today.
"We moved to another pool and trained there for a while but had to leave when the facility was taken over by a new owner.
"The next pool we went to was just too expensive (in terms of rental) so we had to move again."
Cindy, whose swimmers are mostly between 8 to 13 years old, said she had brought up her plight to the authorities in the past and while they did show an interest in helping her, no definitive action was taken.
The former national swimmer is hoping to secure a location which has adequate facilities at an affordable rental rate to make her classes more accessible.
"Swimming pools are usually 50m (long course) or 25m (short course) in length, however, the pool we are currently training at is only 20m long." she said.
"It does not have any lane so we had to improvise using materials bought at a DIY shop, it also does not have any starting block, nor flag for backstrokers.
"My swimmers need proper facilities to take their performances to the next level.
"They also have to pay (the pool operator) RM10 per entry so if they train with me five times a week, which is the minimum for high performance swimmers, it comes up to RM200 per month just for entry. It they have sessions twice a day it quickly adds up.
"This additional cost puts my classes out of reach for swimmers from middle class families, not to mention the Bottom 40 income group."
Sports Minister Hannah Yeoh recently stated that more focus would be placed on boosting development in swimming and athletics as both national teams performances were disappointing at the recent Phnom Penh Sea Games.
National swimmers were only able to win one gold from 39 on offer in the sport in Cambodia.