MYANMAR will send a delegation of more than 600 athletes and support personnel to next month’s Southeast Asian (SEA) Games in Thailand, according to an official from the Ministry of Sports.

A total of 406 athletes will compete in 29 sports events in the 24th SEA Games from December 6-15, said U Naw Thaung, competition and training director at the Sport and Physical Education Department.

The 29 events are baseball, hockey, track and field, archery, billiards and snooker, boxing, soccer, futsal, swimming, diving, judo, gymnastics, karate, pencak silat, sepaktakraw, golf, kickboxing, shooting, table tennis, volleyball, taekwondo, tennis, wushu, yachting, rowing, canoeing/kayaking, traditional rowing, cycling and bodybuilding, U Naw Thaung said.

One notable absence is a women’s weightlifting team – a sport Myanmar clinched a gold medal in at the 2005 SEA Games in the Philippines.

U Naw Thaung said the events Myanmar had the best potential to win golds in this year are rowing, canoeing and kayaking, track and field, archery, shooting, judo and sepaktakraw.

“If we’re lucky, we could also win golds in boxing, billiards, pencak silat, Muay Thai and taekwondo,” he added.

Eleven countries – Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and East Timor – will take part in this year’s 24th SEA Games.

At the last SEA Games in Manila, Myanmar ranked seventh out of 11 countries in the medal table with 17 gold, 34 silver and 48 bronze medals.