2016 GrandSlam Wuhan

WDSF Athletes' Commission chair Ashli Williamson reports from SportAccord in Lausanne, SUI. Exchanging with Kaveh Mehrabi, an Iranian badminton player, Olympian and head of the IOC Athlete Programmes, inspires Ashli to further enhance the athletes' representation within the WDSF structures. Here is her report on day four.

A great day for the WDSF Athletes Commission filled with a lot of inspiration and information to further our athletes community worldwide both within and outside our sport.

I had a 45min meeting with Kaveh Mehrabi the Head of the Athletes Activities Programme.

He informed me that there were many steps that were important for the IOC within the structure of the International Federations. All but one, we fulfill!!!
We have Athlete's represented on the highest political level - The presidium
We have Athlete's represented in many Member Federations.
We have a full Athlete's Commission. Representing all age categories and regions.
+ many more

The one we were missing was:
They recommend that the athlete's are involved in the Technical/Educational Commission to be aware of any changes made pertaining to the athletes.
We will discuss this on our next WDSF AC meeting and go further to the WDSF with a proposal.

3 main issues which we will actively try to pursue in the commission within the next meetings, together with the suggestions and requests from our athletes.

The Athlete's Career Programme - Understanding and Promotion

The Athlete's Online Learning Gateway - Understanding and Promotion

The Athletes's Hub (www.hub.olympic.org) The one stop shop, they call it. This website has been made to be able to get everything you need as an athlete from the one website. - Promotion

The last meeting we had was with FISU (International University Sports Federation). The President Oleg Matytsin sat with us and gave very positive input into how we can be a part of FISU. We are missing very little so it will be exciting to see where this goes in the future.

More Tomorrow...

Ashli Williamson, the chair of the WDSF Athletes' Commission, reports on the third day of the SportAccord convention in the Olympic capital. Here it goes:

Sport Accord Day 3...

Just for clarification, the drink in the photo from yesterday was apple juice :-) :-) :-)

We started out with our first meeting which was jointly organised by the Association of IOC Recognised International Sports Federations (ARISF) and the IOC. Here there were some really great comments made about possible new federations seeking recognition from the IOC, ARISF and SportAccord which could rival existing recognised federations.

Here Kit McConnell, the IOC Sports Director, made it very clear that no new federation will be accepted and/or recognized by the IOC without contacting and having dialogue and agreement with the already existing recognized member federation. For the national member bodies which have had difficulties with other federations claiming to be recognized, this should assure you and us that the IOC recognition lies only with one body and that is the WDSF.

This approach from Kit supports previous advice from the IOC that recognised sports have the right to determine which disciplines they regard as their own.

One of the most important meetings of the week was with Jennifer Mann the head of Sport Partner Relations for the IOC.
This was a follow up meeting, to the highly successful meeting Lukas and Jean-Laurant had with the President of the IOC Thomas Bach on the 18th of March, in Lausanne. Today Lukas Hinder, Tony Tilenni and Jean-Laurant Bourquin had a very clear approach to try to get DanceSport onto and/or part of the Youth Olympic Games (YOG) in one form or another.  We, the Athlete's Commission look forward to following this project and hopefully having our Youth athletes having a future roll in the YOG.

For the Athletes Commission it was also a great day. I was able to set up an appointment with both Angela Ruggiero the Vice-Chair of the IOC Athletes Commission and Kaveh Mehrabi Head of the Athletes Activities Programme.

Both these meeting will take place within the next few days.

I will keep you updated :)

During the SportAccord convention in Lausanne, the International World Games Association (IWGA) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) signed a second Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that establishes the new parameters for an even closer cooperation between the two organisations. It supersedes the MoU that was concluded in October 2000 between the then Presidents Juan Antonio Samaranch (†) and Ron Froehlich in Monaco.

The new MoU underlines the closer cooperation between the IOC and the IWGA which evolves from the Recommendation 6.1 of Olympic Agenda 2020. This states “…the IOC and the IWGA to closely cooperate regarding the sports programme composition and their respective evaluations.” The new agreement confirms that “the IOC recognises the importance of The World Games as a multi-sport event and the IWGA is committed to develop its activities in the Olympic spirit and in conformity with the Olympic Charter.”

WDSF President Lukas Hinder who - as a member of the IWGA board - was present at the signing ceremony comments the new MoU: "The 2000 MoU which governed the cooperation between IWGA and IOC until now addressed some of the same points, particularly when it comes to the composition of the sports programme for The World Games," Hinder said. "Where important advances could come in is in the area of technical assistance to be provided by the IOC to the IWGA. The possibilities of closer cooperation in areas such as communication, promotion and marketing shall now be explored."

Ashli Williamson, the chair of the WDSF Athletes' Commission, danced the GrandSlam Standard in Wuhan, CHN, where she and partner Bjorn Bitsch ended up in sixth place on Sunday. First thing on Monday - at 5 a.m. to be exact - she left Central China and flew via Beijing to Geneva, SUI, and travelled on to nearby Lausanne. There she currently attends the 2016 edition of SportAccord - together with WDSF President Lukas Hinder and Treasurer Tony Tilenni. From this four-day convention in the Olympic capital, Ashli promised to file reports on a regular basis. Here is first one.

So far the Sport Accord 2016 has been a fruitful one for the WDSF.

With our new President Lukas Hinder being the treasurer of the International World Games Association (IWGA), the convention started with the Annual General Assembly for the IWGA and ran smoothly, with DanceSport having an active roll. This opened a lot of doors for WDSF's networking throughout the week.

I had the pleasure of attending, together with Lukas Hinder and Tony Tilenni numerous meetings today. All of which were very interesting and proved to be successful in moving DanceSport forward in the world of sport.

For example having a meeting with a new digital channel (The Olympic Channel) which would like DanceSport to be a part of this new project. This could give DanceSport exposure to new audiences in a whole new way.

Another important meeting was with the CEO of the International Paralympic Committee, Mr. Xavier Gonzalez, where the next steps were taken to ensure an even better connection with the Paralympic Games.

The official ceremony was this evening where the President of IOC, Thomas Bach gave a very good speech about how important it is for the IOC that all International Federations have good governance in direct connection with clean athletes. On this point the WDSF can be proud to be on the track with clear ideas and now roadmaps to make our sport clean in all areas.

I was delighted to hear the final piece of the presentation where it was announced that Aarhus, Denmark will be the next host of Sport Accord in 2017, 25 minutes from my home. As Aarhus has been chosen to be the Culture Capital in 2017 this was a nice surprize. Now we just have to get DanceSport a roll in this great convention for all sports. :-)

In Saturday's Latin final we saw three couples fighting out the victory at much closer range than in many of the previous GrandSlams, winning minimum one dance each, and staying within decimal points of one another in some of the dances.

Just prior to the Standard final on Sunday we asked the Danish coach Bo Loft Jensen how he explains this dramatic increase in competition drama that was appreciated by everybody - maybe even the couples concerned.

The 2016 GrandSlam Standard Wuhan came to an end at 22:40 local time on Sunday 17 April. As in the GrandSlam Latin on the previous night, it concluded with another final round marked by superb dancing, great competitiveness and a special magic. In the final tally of points, Russians Dmitry Zharkov and Olga Kulikova edged out Simone Segatori and Annette Sudol with 192.085 to 191.757, claiming their fourth consecutive victory over the Germans.


The full results are up!

The first three rounds of the GrandSlam Standard were danced in front of a relatively low number of spectators. At least that is the impression one got when looking around this immense arena. Most likely, a few thousand people were here - and that is not at all bad for an afternoon session.

Talking to some of the experts sitting at the VIP tables around the floor, we were told that the couples still in contention seem all very inspired and that the next two rounds should be a treat. The evening session should start shortly. Stay tuned for the results after the quarterfinal and the starting list for the semi-final!

The picture on the left shows Armen Tsaturyan and Svetlana Gudyno, RUS, in the kiss & cry zone - and their exemplary interaction with the cameraman.

The atmosphere at the Wuhan Sports Arena was oustanding during the final last night. The crowd - numerous and in excellent spirits - cheered on all the couples equally. The moments of maximum decibels were the ones when the scores went up. Why? Because every now and then these scores surprised even the experts.