• Submitted by: lena campos
• Sports
• 03 / 14 / 2014

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Cuba expects to classify more than 550 athletes for the 22nd Central American and Caribbean Games to be played in November this year in Veracruz, Mexico, reports Granma newspaper.

"This is what we are working for," noted Norge Marrero, director of high performance sports at the Cuban Sports Institute (INDER), in an interview published Friday in the Cuban newspaper.

According to Marrero, Cuba currently has 316 contestants ranked in 22 sports, with just four disciplines left to be confirmed: fencing, skating, pentathlon and triathlon, although Cuba has made the grade for participation, but has not yet received word from the Central American and the Caribbean Sports Organization.

Male and female basketball teams, boxing, judo, karate, and wrestling, also remain to be contested, along with skating, the pentathlon and table tennis, he said.

Marrero added that taekwondo, athletics, which requires minimum marks in different skills still to be constested; baseball (by invitation and to be announced), diving (qualified according to the ranking) and swimming according to times are others that remain to be decided. "The boys have performed one hundred percent of what was planned to make their quotas and, so far, no-one has been left behind," he said.

"Cubans and Mexicans have been always great rivals. They led the event until 1970 and from that point on we prevailed in every edition in which we participated. The battle will be difficult once again, also for the great competitiveness from the representatives of Colombia and Venezuela. In addition the competition schedule has been prepared to favor the hosts, with the first days set for swimming and synchronized swimming where they are strong," Marrero said.

Cuba's last participation in the Central American and Caribbean Games was in Cartagena de Indias-2006, where Cuban athletes totaled 139 gold medals, 86 silver and 60 bronze, well ahead of Mexico (107-82-87).

Source: Prensa Latina