IPC Presence at the World Adaptive Surfing Championship

(ATR) The 2017 Stance ISA World Adaptive Surfing Championship opened on Thursday with a crowd that included International Paralympic Committee Vice President Duane Kale.

The third annual edition of the event is the first to take place since the International Surfing Association received recognition from the IPC in July. Earlier this month, the ISA officially submitted its "declaration of intent" to the IPC as it works to get adaptive surfing, also called para surfing, into the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games.

"It was a great opportunity having been in the area to come and actually see the meet," Kale told Around the Rings.

The 50-year-old from New Zealand was already in southern California, having joined IPC President Andrew Parsons earlier this week to tour the venues that will be used in the 2028 Paralympic Games.

"For someone from the [IPC] board to be able to talk with a little bit of information, not being a surfer, but with some degree of understanding of this is how it operates, this is the environment and trying to get a feel for how the sport is growing… and just seeing how it runs in practice" will help the IPC in its decision, says Kale, who won six medals, four of them gold, in swimming at the 1996 Paralympics in Atlanta.

The ISA’s efforts to create gender equality will likely play well with the IPC, which views it as a priority. Kale says that while a number of sports are going to struggle with gender balance "it’s the right thing to do".

The event this week marks the first time in its three-year history that women’s divisions are part of the program. Five of the six divisions will crown the first-ever women world champions in the sport. The women take to the waves beginning on Friday.

Twenty women from 10 countries are set to compete, nearly tripling the total of seven women from five countries who took part last year. Kale is not worried about the numbers at this point.

"While numbers might be a little bit low, you start a program and it will build. And these people here will go back and talk about the amazing event that they experienced and no doubt have connections and friends that are involved and who knows we could draw other people with physical impairments to the surfing association."

The increase in the number of women participating at La Jolla Shores beach has helped bring a record 109 athletes from a record 26 countries to the World Championship, easily surpassing the previous marks of 77 athletes from 21 countries set in 2016.

The growth will need to continue as Kale tells ATR that the IPC would want not only the five regions of the world represented but that at least 35 countries would need to be involved in the sport. In the case of para surfing, there is something else to consider.

"One of the things we would be looking for is how many participating countries here are coastal. Not that that’s necessarily a requirement but it’s potentially a barrier for countries to be involved," Kale says.

"And then we would look at the organization, the financial sustainability of the federation, what they’re doing from a marketing point of view to raise their sports and the biggie would be the classification system that they have evolved. Classification underpins everything about Paralympic sport."

The ISA has been working to strengthen its classification system and it was a point of emphasis at the federation’s Adaptive Surfing Symposium held earlier this week.

Written and reported by Gerard Farekin La Jolla, California

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