Athletics Australia is delighted with the announcement today that the Australian Labor Party is committing $10 million to build a world class, high performance athletics centre, that will be called the Kurt Fearnley Centre of Excellence.
The centre to be located at Sydney Olympic Park, which will mark its 20th anniversary from the 2000 Sydney Olympics and Paralympics next year, will be a state of the art training venue for Australian athletics, that will provide significant benefits to community athletics right through to elite high performance.
On site for the announcement with Sam Crosby – Labor’s candidate for Reid, Athletics Australia CEO Darren Gocher said the centre was a great step forward for athletics and great news that Australian legend Kurt Fearnley would be honoured.
“Labor have committed $10 million to build the facility, which is tremendous news for athletics in Australia,” Mr Gocher said.
“We all know the amazing career that Kurt achieved, so to build the Centre in Sydney Olympic Park where Kurt commenced his decorated international career at the 2000 Sydney Paralympics is great.”
Three time Paralympic gold medallist, Kurt Fearnley said this was a brilliant way to secure the future of Australian Para Athletics and the wider athletics family.
“Next year is the 20th Anniversary of the Sydney Olympics and I couldn’t imagine a more appropriate time to establish this centre- it will give our future athletes the best possible facilities to take on the world,” Mr Fearnley said.
“It’s an honour to have my name attached to the venue that will develop the future of my sport and it’s exciting to think that around the country developing disabled athletes see one of their peers names attached to the centre that will assist all of the athletics community.”
