Delhi: All cyclists test negative for COVID-19; national camp to begin from Aug 14

National cycling camp will begin at Delhi's Indira Gandhi National Stadium from August 14 as all 11 cyclists, four coaches and 16 support staff have reported to the camp, tested negative for COVID-19 and are undergoing mandatory quarantine. 

As a proactive and mandatory step, the Sports Authority of India has administered the COVID test to all participants, including athletes, coaches, support staff (sporting and non-sporting such as housekeeping, cooks etc) on arrival. The test reports confirm that all of them are COVID negative.

As a further precautionary measure all athletes, coaches and support staff will be given the test before the start of the camp to ensure that everyone attending the on-field training from August 14 and interacting with athletes, including the athletes themselves, are COVID free.

READ | Junior Paddler Swastika Gosh Facing Financial Crisis In Mumbai Due To Lockdown

READ | Shubhankar Sharma Misses Cut For Second Straight Week, Leader Sullivan Sparks On Back Nine

The quarantine zone where athletes, coaches and support staff are housed has been earmarked as the Green Zone and no outsider is being allowed to access the zone or interact with the team in order to ensure complete sanitisation.

Additionally, a doctor and nursing staff have been stationed in the facility around the clock so that any sudden emergency can be dealt with. The SOP drawn up by SAI and the Health Ministry guidelines are being strictly implemented on campus.

Earlier, four Indian Hockey Players, including captain Manpreet Singh test Positive on arrival at SAI Bengaluru for Hockey National Camp. Apart from Manpreet, Surender Kumar, Jaskaran Singh and Varun Kumar, who reported to the National Hockey Camp in Sports Authority of India's National Centre of Excellence (NCOE) in Bengaluru along with the team, after a home break, have tested COVID positive.

This was revealed since as a proactive step, SAI made it mandatory for all athletes, who reported back to the camp to take a rapid COVID-19 test upon arrival. 

Since all the athletes who tested positive had travelled together, there is a high likelihood that they contracted the virus while travelling from their hometowns to Bengaluru. 

All four tested negative in the rapid antigen test. However, since Manpreet and Surender began to display some COVID symptoms later, they along with other ten athletes who had travelled together were given the quantitative RT-PCR test on Thursday, and the four have been found to be COVID positive.

(PTI image for representation)

READ | Bindra To Take Part In 'virtual Run' To Raise Funds For People Affected By COVID-19

READ | Coronavirus LIVE Updates