Sakovich pleased with Tagaman

Now that international field of the triathletes has taken leave of Saipan and returned to everyday life, the organizers of the 17th Tagaman Triathlon and the Saipan Sportsfest gathered in the Marianas Visitors Authority conference room in San Jose to recap the weeks that were and to scheme for a more successful event in 2007.

From those who tested the choppy 1.5-kilometer swim, rugged 30-km mountain bike, and rigorous 12-km trail run of the XTERRA Saipan Championship to the endurance aficionados who spent their Saturday morning engaging the 2-km lagoon swim, 60-km road bike, and 15-km run along the Beach Pathway and the American Memorial Park, triathletes from throughout the region and beyond sent back a lot of positive feedback about their multi-sport experience in the Marianas.

During the meeting, Taga Inc. president Bill Sakovich took the time to thank all who participated in making the event a success and fielded suggestions that could take the local races to the next level in terms of quality as well as the quantity of entrants.

“I’d like to thank everyone for participating starting out with the organizing committee of J.M. Guerrero, Wolf Mojica, and Yoichi Matsumura. There’s no way that this event could continue going without them. I want to thank XTERRA for letting us piggy back them because I think it’s made our event that much better,” he said.

Sakovich also praised Laurie Peterka and JTL Timing’s Jim Lovell for providing the participants with instant results when they crossed the finish line of both the XTERRA Saipan Championship and Tagaman Triathlon.

“They’re fantastic. There’s not too many places where you can get your results seconds after finishing,” said Sakovich.

The longtime Saipan resident and sage of the local sports scene also gave thanks to a large group of people and organizations for making the event possible.

“The Department of Public Safety, Public Health, the radio clubs who provided the communications throughout the course, the aid stations and the various businesses that greeted the athletes and kept them cool so that they could keep going, the Pacific Islands Club, the Palau association, Daisy Yu who helped out with the Korean participants, the mayor of Saipan for supporting all of our sports events, Marpac, Coca-Cola, the Pacific Islands Club, and Northwest Airlines,” he said.

Sakovich also thanked Miss Teen Marianas Myanna Welch for helping with the presentations said that there many more who contributed to the event, and that he hopes everyone continues to do so in the future as well.

“It was a great event, ands we look forward to seeing everyone next year. We had people from all around and we’re working on Northwest Airlines to try and get some special rates for next year to get more people out here,” he said.