P. H. D. Waidyatilaka, Presient of the Athletic Technical Officials Association has been appointed as an International Technical Official (ITO) by the International Association of Athletic Federations (IAAF).

Waidyatilaka has come first in Asia in the competitive examination held world wide in October 2001. He also has a habit of coming first in competitive examinations. In 1997 he qualified as an Area Technical Official (Asia) after scoring full marks at the written examinations.

One of the examiners had remarked "I understand you have come first in the IAAF Lecturers’ Examination in 1995 too and what is your secret behind such great performance.

Waidyatilaka is a highly respected technical official with wide experience in officiating at international meets. He has the unique distinction of being the only Sri Lankan athletic official to officiate at a Commonwealth Games.

He has done yeoman service to uplift the standard of officiating in Sri Lanka by conducting island wide seminars and examinations.

He is also responsible for streamlining the examination system to fall in line with the IAAF system and introducing a promotion and grading scheme based on examinations.

He contributed a series of articles on IAAF Technical Rules to ‘The Island’ which helped the candidates who sat the technical examination in February 2001.

For the first time in Sri Lanka an IAAF Level 1 course was conducted by Waidyatilaka in mid 2000, for senior officials. 23 passed the examination out of 26 candidates and 7 qualified to proceed to Level 2.

In addition to being an ITO and IAAF lecturer he is an Asia AAA Technical Committee Member and Chairman — Technical Committee of the Asian Veteran Athletic Association.