Dominican Republic, the Country made of Gold

GWANGJU – The Dominican Republic occupies a territory of 48,734 square kilometres and its population is 10,528,954 people, a little Caribbean Country but with great athletes of high category, and that is being demonstrated here at this Summer Universiade. It is an honour for the Dominican Republic and the Americas that the country is on the podium with two medals.  

“Our country is small and we are without budget, and in spite of that we have gotten very important achievements. Such events have a very high and competitive sporting level. Our country is committed to the university sport and this type of events raises the quality and technical level of the competitors, I mean that is a mandatory appointment especially for small countries like ours. These are important opportunities and invaluable experiences for the athletes”, said Luis Peláez Sterling, Deputy Head of Delegation of the Dominican Republic.

Luguelin Miguel Santos Aquino is currently the runner number one of the Dominican Republic and he will also participate in the 2015 Pan-American Games. He began his work in sports from a young age, at 16, in the city of Bayaguana and was champion of the Youth Games in the Dominican Republic and from there went to the Youth Olympics and also won the gold medal. He won an Olympic silver medal in London here in Gwangju he got double gold winning the men’s 400m and also the men’s 4x400m relay category. “I’m very happy with my results and with the team’s results. The competitions were very good and this Universiade has a high sporting level. The truth is that we have fulfilled our expectations, but even more, we have overcome them because we knew which were our objectives and we knew what we were looking for, and finally we got it!”, Luguelin commented.

Karen Quintero (COL), FISU Young Reporter