Winter Games NZ Receives International Support

Winter Games NZ receives endorsement from international snow sports community

LAKE WANAKA, New Zealand (June 24, 2008) - Next year’s Winter Games NZ initiative received backing from the international snow sports community at the recent FIS Congress in Cape Town, South Africa with FIS pledging its support for the event.

The 46th international FIS Congress brought together 1,100 delegates representing all the snow sports with the overall objective of developing snow sports around the world. It is also the time when the international calendar is set and snow sports representation at the Olympics is discussed.

Winter Games NZ CEO, Arthur Klap, made representations to five individual committees – x-country, snowboard, freestyle, alpine skiing and intercontinental cup as well as the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) with the positive feedback resulting in an adjustment of the event’s targets.

“The feedback we got from the various committees was so positive that we have now increased our number of projected athletes for the inaugural games by 30%, from 600 to 800,” said Klap. “The event provided us with the benefit of talking to key people from different sports around the world, all of whom were very excited about the opportunity Winter Games NZ will present to elite athletes.”

Another outcome of the congress was the IPC has set the qualifying standard for Winter Games NZ as the same as the Paralympics. This is a direct result of Winter Games NZ’s progressive decision to include adaptive skiing in the mainstream programme and highlights the importance attached to Winter Games NZ.

Winter Games NZ will take place at Coronet Peak, The Remarkables, Cardrona Alpine Resort, Treble Cone, Snow Farm, Naseby and Dunedin from August 28 to September 6 next year and will feature disciplines of alpine skiing, free skiing, x-country skiing, snowboarding, curling, ice skating and adaptive snow sports.

ENDS

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