Los Angeles Laker superstar Kobe Bryant arrived in Dubai to kick off his health and fitness weekend to raise diabetes awareness.
“I’m enjoying Dubai. It is my first time here… I’m looking forward to the days that I am spending here and the chance to enjoy it and learn more about the culture first hand,” said Bryant.
We often hear about diabetes statistics here in the U.S.; however, it’s a worldwide epidemic.
According to Dr Ghada Aoun, medical director and specialist endocrinologist and diabetologist at Boston Diabetes and Endocrine Centre, “371 million people around the world are diabetic and with about 50 percent still undiagnosed. Four of the top ten countries in the world with a diabetes epidemic are from the Middle East. Kuwait is number six, Saudi Arabia is number seven, Qatar number eight and Bahrain number nine. The United Arab Emirates ranks 11th with a prevalence of 18.9 percent.”
Bryant offered the crowd a bit of his personal experience and advice on health and fitness.
“An important thing for me and throughout my career is the idea of constantly challenging yourself. We all go through adversities and we all have obstacles and I think it’s important to try to inspire the youth and inspire each other. I think the most important thing is this aspect and this idea of being inspired. The hardest part of getting older is not training, because you are so used to training for so many years, the hardest part is being able to change the diet. You get accustomed to eating bad food your entire life and now you have to have the determination and a struggle with yourself to put that stuff to the side and actually start eating healthy for the first time. This changed about three years ago when I started becoming insanely competitive with what I am eating. Now I eat for performance, eat for recovery. It’s eating with a purpose. Whether it’s basketball or football it doesn’t matter – as long as you’re healthy. Get out with your friends. Don’t be lazy. Play, have fun, compete, be active.”
The Kobe Bryant Health and Fitness Weekend included a youth basketball skills clinic for 40 students at GEMS American Academy in Abu Dhabi with players from the Real Madrid basketball ‘Legends’ team helping Bryant with student training drills followed by a celebrity basketball game that was held at the Knights Arena on the campus of American University in Dubai. Bryant led the warm-up and coached a team of celebrity players called Team Black Mamba, who played against the Real Madrid basketball legends. Kobe’s team won with a 72-63 victory.
Check out some photos of the weekend events here.
