Andrew Clarke (GBR), new Chair of the FIS Telemark Committee

Voices of New Chairmen IV: Andrew Clarke (GBR)

In this fourth and final part of the series, the FIS Newsflash presents the initial thoughts by the sixth new Committee Chairman following their appointment by the FIS Council in Antalya (TUR):

Andrew Clarke (GBR), new Chair of the Telemark Committee

“Of course I am very pleased that the FIS Council appointed me to the role of the chair of the Telemark Committee after the retirement of Anthony Favre (FRA). I look forward to this honorable task.

I think the priority of our Committee will be the promotion of our discipline. I am very dedicated and passionate about Telemark and one of our Committee’s aspirations and long-term goals will be to investigate the process and possibility to get Telemark Skiing recognized for the Olympic Winter Games in the future.

Another point we should focus on is trying to make the sport more attractive and accessible to the junior athletes so that we can run the Junior World Championships separately from the main ones in the future.

In the last four years, our discipline has been growing and attracting attention on a global level. Several nations have shown an interest to get involved at the Committee level. The Czech Republic is on the Committee as of this year and Japan has submitted a request for membership to the Council.

We have also been able to make improvements to the calendar; Great Britain ran its first World Cup race in Austria and is hoping to do it again next year. With Méribel staging its first ever Telemark World Cup event, we were able to break into bigger venue locations.

I believe that in a few years we will attract more interest from the sponsors as well as TV coverage if we keep making the sport more spectator-friendly. It must be easy for the spectator to follow at every level of the competition. It will also be important to continue to get more people involved and interested in the sport, especially the younger generations.”

Transcribed by Sandra Kühni

This article was reprinted from the 8/25/10 FIS Newsflash