Having won gold and silver medals in the Athletics World Championship, our Paralympic team was solemnly welcomed back with flowers and acclamation at the Riga international airport as it returned from Doha, Qatar.
As reported previously, Aigars Apinis (gold medal in discus throwing, and a new world record), Edgars Bergs (silver medal in shot put) and Dmitrijs Silovs (silver medal in javelin throwing) were the members of the team prepared by the Latvian Paralympic Committee who achieved the most outstanding results at the Athletics World Championship. Similarly, Diāna Dadzīte came fourth in shot put.
"The Latvian Paralympic Team had outstanding success at the Athletics World Championship, thus making another step closer to the Summer Paralympic Games that will take place in Rio de Janeiro in the autumn of 2016. We are delighted about our Paralympic team's success and we hope that the achieved results will continue inspiring athletes in the future. The World Championship takes place once in two years therefore I am well aware of how much work athletes must invest in order to qualify for this event and to show strong performance," Daiga Dadzīte, president of the Latvian Paralympic Committee (LPK) comments.
The Latvian team that took part in the Athletics World Championship in Doha in 21–31 October 2015 consisted of Aigars Apinis (discus throwing), Edgars Kļaviņš (100 m and 200 m track), Edgars Bergs (shot put) Dmitrijs Silovs (long jump, shot put, javelin throwing), Ingrīda Priede (discus throwing), Taiga Kantāne (shot put, discus throwing) and Diāna Dadzīte (javelin and discus throwing, shot put).
"Congratulations to the team, and we are glad to see that our Paralympic athletes have shown strong performance once again. The donors' great response in the 'They can. Can we?' campaign organized by Citadele Bank is one of the types of support that enables our team to compete with the world's best athletes. We are glad for being able to raise nearly EUR 10 000 out of the planned EUR 40 000 with the society's support. We would like to thank all donors for their responsiveness, and encourage others to become part of the 'They can. Can we?' campaign that we launched this September in order for our Paralympic team to have greater opportunities to train and participate in the qualification competition so that they can represent our country in the next year's Summer Paralympic Games," says Baiba Ābelniece, Head of Citadele Bank's External Communications.
As reported previously, in 2012, Citadele Bank launched currently the most voluminous support program for Latvian Paralympics and the movement "You are. You can." in order to facilitate the development of Paralympic sports in Latvia, engage an increasing number of young people with disability in sports and change the society's attitude towards people with disability and their capabilities. In September 2015, we launched the 'They can. Can we?' fund raising campaign in order to help as many Paralympic team members as possible to qualify and participate in the Rio de Janeiro Summer Paralympic Games of 2016. A special website www.tuesituvari.lv was started for this purpose. Donation boxes are located at Citadele Bank's branch offices and at the Kino Citadele cinema.