A NEW £20 million sports science institute based on the Australian Institute of Sport and America's National Sports Institute in Colorado is planned for Dublin within the next two years.
The scheme will be privately financed by businessman Albert Gubay, who owns health clubs in Castleknock and on the Malahide Road in Dublin. He believes it will revolutionise Irish sport.
The septuagenarian multi-millionaire has plans for the new development in the Dublin suburb of Ballinteer in the south west of the city. Gubay, who has made a fortune estimated at £250 million plans to set up the hi-tech institute with a view to attracting top class sportsmen and women from all over Europe, as well as those based in Ireland.
The institute will have state-of-the-art facilities as well as testing and monitoring laboratories which will aid training techniques for international athletes and employ scientific procedures that will recognise latent talent in young sportsmen and women. It will also cater for lower-level health and fitness interests.
"I recently went to a laboratory in Germany and asked scientists why their sports stars did so well in competitions like the Olympic Games. He told me that they take talented 10 or 11-year-olds and send them to a centre where their potential can be assessed. If they are then given a proper scientific training programme, it can help them to realise their talents," said Gubay yesterday.
"Instead of athletes having to go to three or four different places for either injury, or monitoring, or checkups, they can come to just one place."
The need for the institute, he believes, has never been greater with athletes often having to travel to the United States or Germany to get the specialist treatment they require.
World champion 5,000 metres runner Sonia O'Sullivan, for example, travels to Florida to see Ger Hartman, while former Olympic 100 metres gold medallist Linford Christie goes to Munich for his injury needs.
The centre will occupy 40,000 square feet and, when completed, will employ between 50 and 80 people. Impoverished sports players will, says the businessman, pay less and in some instances may avail of the facilities for free, while those who can afford it will pay a fee.
These bursaries will be paid for by the Total Fitness Centre which will be situated in the Institute and should operate on a profitable basis.
Gubay has plans to open other fitness centres (as opposed to sports science institutes) in Galway, Belfast and Cork, and he believes that the national sports institute will increase membership in these centres.
According to Gubay, the scheme will be only the third of its' kind in the world, after Australia and the US. He will particularly look to the British market and hopes that Premiership footballers, European golfers, professional rugby players and top-class athletes will attend and pay for checkups and treatment.
Gubay has had meetings with the Irish Sports Council, headed by John Treacy, and has given them an outline of his proposals to date.
"He has spoken to us," confirmed Treacy. "Although it is early days, it sounds exciting and, certainly, we will be watching and waiting with anticipation."
Gubay, who made his fortune setting up and selling the Kwik Save supermarket group before moving into property and shopping centres, moved to Dublin with his second wife two years ago. At 70, he still works out three times a week and has no plans to move back to Britain.
