Barcelona to Host One of the Youngest Sports - Federation Focus

(ATR) The world governing body for skate and roller sports chooses Barcelona as its location for this year’s World Scooter Championships.

The Championships, held as part of the "Extreme Barcelona" sports festival, will take place on September 25-26 at the city’s Parc del Fòrum. This will be the second World Skate-sanctioned edition of the event with the first held in 2019, also in Barcelona, as part of that year’s World Roller Games.

"We are so excited to come back to Barcelona for the Scooter World Championships," said World Skate President Sabatino Aracu. "One of the youngest sports in one of the cities that youth love most; such a perfect match!".

Park and street disciplines for both men and women will be featured. The Championships will be live streamed on World Skate TV, and organized in partnership with the SevenMila event agency.

The Championships are scheduled to take place almost two months after skateboarding makes its debut Olympic appearance at Tokyo 2020 – the first World Skate-governed discipline to do so.

ITF Schedules 2021 World Participation Conference

The International Tennis Federation announced on Wednesday that the third edition of the ITF World Participation Conference will take place on July 12-14.

The annual conference, first held in 2018, aims to promote increased global participation in tennis and sports in general. At the event, the ITF plans to reveal updates to its Global Tennis Report, assessing the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on tennis participation. It will also discuss the rollout of the ITF World Tennis Number, a new single global rating system for players of all levels.

Keynote speakers at the event include Martina Hingis and Judy Murray, while speakers from FIFA, UCI, Olympic Solidarity and other governing bodies are also expected.

ITF’s Executive Director of Development, Luca Santilli, said "We are pleased to be able to host this event virtually after cancellation in 2020. It is the first time that we will be able to gather leaders within tennis and sport to share experiences and learnings from the pandemic and to make some initial assessments of its impact on participation around the world."

This year marks the first time the Conference will be held virtually, giving anyone wishing to attend the opportunity to do so.

World Rugby Showcases Sevens

World Rugby launches a new major rugby sevens campaign in the run up to the Tokyo Olympics.

"This Is How We Sevens" aims to showcase the sport to fans both existing and new across a seven-week period.

A sevens-specific "Open Side" interview series will feature Carlin Isles, Dan Norton and Celia Quansah. There will also be a sevens flavor to the Ultimate Rugby Challenge Series and newer fans can learn more about the game in the "Freshman Fan" series on World Rugby’s Tik Tok channel.

Fans can follow the campaign across all World Rugby’s social platforms using #HowWeSevens

The final two women’s and one men’s teams qualification spots for Tokyo will be determined at the World Rugby Sevens Repechage in Monaco from June 18-20. Fans can watch the action live on World Rugby’s website, YouTube and Facebook platforms.

World Rugby earlier this week announced the appointment of Nicky Ponsford as Women’s High-Performance Manager on a two-year secondment from the RFU starting in July.

Joe Schmidt, World Rugby Director of Rugby and High Performance said Ponsford "brings vital experience and knowledge, having led women’s high-performance programs in England since 2002".

The appointment comes as World Rugby’s Executive Committee approved an additional £600,000 ($840,723) to the initial £2 million ($2.8 million) Rugby World Cup High Performance Preparation Fund, announced following the postponement of the 2021 tournament earlier this year.

Federation Focus is presented by the International Weightlifting Federation. Click here for more on the IWF.

Written by Filip Vachuda and Gerard Farek

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