Top Chinese marathoner promises to boost up Seychelles Eco-Friendly marathon
ATP- arab tourism portal- Sun Yingjie, a top retired Chinese marathoner has described her experience in Seychelles as enriching and promised to help the country to make its Eco-friendly marathon one of the best.
She was speaking during a courtesy call to the Tourism and Culture Minister Alain St.Ange a day after taking part in the eight edition of the Seychelles Eco-Friendly marathon.
Mrs Sun is married and now owns a sports club. Her key achievements include finishing as the top first place winner in the 24th and 25th Beijing International marathon, which is one of the sixth top marathons in the world. She also finished in fourth place in the 106th Boston marathon in 2002.
The Chinese marathoner retired in 2009, after 16 years doing this sport. She has around 300,000 followers on social network Weibo.
She teamed up with Puma China and NetEase, a leading China-based internet technology company, to promote social and sports networking in her country.
On behalf of the Seychelles Tourism Board’s chief executive Sherin Naiken and himself, Minister St.Ange thanked the athlete for supporting our marathon.
Discussions centred on how Puma and Mrs Sun’s expertise in this sport can be of great benefit to Seychelles.
Minister St.Ange said good brands like Seychelles need to be affiliated with top brands like Puma, adding that it will be a plus for our islands to have visibility when our brand is associated with names of top athletes like her.
He urged the Chinese marathon runner to help Seychelles to promote our sports culture and to become a good ambassador for our islands when she gets back to China.
On her part, Mrs Sun said she had a great Chinese New Year experience in Seychelles, and will use this to promote Seychelles in her country as one of the best destinations, adding that she will also promote the marathon event held here annually.
She aims to promote the Seychelles Eco-Friendly marathon and make it more known to the world and attract more top runners to take part in.
Minister St.Ange has invited her to be part of the 2015 Carnaval International de Victoria which will be celebrating its fifth anniversary this year.
Before leaving, Mrs Sun was presented with a book of Seychelles by the Minister.
