HAVING not competed for eight years as a martial artist after surgery, sports-loving businessman Jason McKay said he is happy to be making a return to the international arena via dragon-boat racing.

McKay captains a Jamaican mixed-team for the Bahamas International Dragon Boat Festival, set for Goodman’s Bay, Nassau, on August 30 and 31.

“It’s great being a competitor again and I am particularly pleased that I have the opportunity to be there at the beginning of Jamaica’s international journey into dragon boat racing,” McKay, who is on the verge of representing Jamaica in three sports, having already donned national colours in rugby and martial arts, says.

Reminiscing, McKay recounts how his love affair with sports started at Calabar High School.

“At Calabar, in the 1980s, sport was like a religion,” he says.

“I played rugby for Team Arawak and was blessed to represent Jamaica on the adult team while still a junior. I was obsessed with making Calabar’s track team. I eventually did but the results were not encouraging. I afterwards got into martial arts in 1989, which was my breakthrough.”

Through McKay Security, McKay sponsors the Jamaica combined martial arts team — which he founded, coached and competed with as a fighter, 2005-2017 — while managing the unit from inception.

The McKay Security-sponsored dragon boat team that won June’s mixed-team event at the Jamaica Dragon Boat Festival has seven combined martial arts team members in its line-up. They are International Sport Kickboxing Association’s Amateur Members Association World Championships gold medallists, including three reigning world champions — Akino Lindsay, Richard Stone, and Akeem Lawrence.

Having taken local martial artists from varying disciplines to compete worldwide as a combined martial arts team, McKay hopes for a similar breakthrough in dragon boat racing.

“My cousin, Gerry, is an international figure in the sport, so is her husband and son,” he says.

Noting that dragon boat racing has, “started on the correct footing with the Chinese Benevolent Association (CBA) providing the infrastructure required for the sport to function”, McKay also hails the newly formed Jamaica Dragon Boat Federation (JDF), led by President Dalton Yap and Vice-President Neil Yap Sam.

“The CBA and JDF providing tools such as boats and training venue, Grand Hotel Excelsior, Port Royal, makes it easy to practise — a seamless participation,” he says. “This combination will grow the sport exponentially, especially when it becomes a full Olympic event.”

Calling out other corporate sponsors, McKay says their involvement in sports would reap significant social benefits which impact businesses and, generally, benefit the country.

“Sports create a distraction for the whole country — whether football, horse racing or international events,” McKay says. “The momentary escape unites communities and the country. Sports, however, cannot function without sponsorship.

“Sports also create opportunities for the young, and encourage a healthy lifestyle for all who participate, minimising negative activities such as the consumption of alcohol and smoking,”

Apart from being a competitor McKay says he has always put his company’s support behind sports.

McKay’s firm sponsors two parish football associations — the Kingston and St Andrew Football Association (KSAFA) and the St Thomas Football Association — in addition to inking kit and gear deals with dozens of teams in the St Catherine Football Association (SCFA).

McKay also owns major shares in two football teams in two parish associations – New Raiders of SCFA and KSAFA’s Meadhaven, of which he is also president.

“By being a participant I realised the incredible benefits of sponsorship to both athlete and sponsor so I dedicated my company to ensure that its marketing arm would be committed to focus its budget on sports sponsorships,” he says.

“It became a comparative of the use of the dollar for traditional advertising as opposed to being the face of a sportsman, sportswoman, a team or sporting body. Traditional advertising was no match.”

Travelling manager and part-sponsor of the Jamaica Constabulary Force’s Police Nationals netball team, McKay has also sponsored sport shooters from the Jamaica Rifle Association, and bodybuilders competing internationally.