The Pullers Consortium

[simon]

I know it will break many peoples heart to hear that I have pretty full day of meetings today so I will not be writing any novels out here.

I have had several conversations on this subject so I just wanted to bring everyone up to speed and reach out to everyone reading about what I think we should start with.

The idea of the pullers banding together and trying to make improvements in this sport is brilliant but I think for some people reading this they may see me or anyone else that has currently spoke on it and they will discount its validity or its unbiased integrity based purely upon that or their believe that nothing will really get done, so here is what I propose.

Get informed, find out everything we can about the IOC the GAISF and any other sports organization in the US and the world that can assist in further legitimizing this sport, talk to the leaders of other sports that already have some level of recognition and find out what they have done and what they have to continue to do. Once we get a clear picture of what can be done and what has to be done in order to obtain a certain status in the sporting world then we can seriously discuss getting all of the pullers into a group and pursuing the option that the group feels strongly is the appropriate path for us, again I think it makes sense to develop a clear intent with some factual information, I think that is something that everyone can get behind.

At present I think what is needed is help researching and finding like sporting organizations that we can approach for information and guidance. If you have a contact either ask them for information or pass them along and I will inquire, search the web for sporting organizations and pass them along, it would be good if we made it public who was approaching whom so they don’t each get hit by multiple people

Mr. Colleti offered up the AAU and I have already contacted them. I am working on a few others that I will advise on.

[simon]

Below is just a partial list of the organizations I am working on contacting those that are more closely attached to the IOC I will contact later after I have hopefully received some assisting information from some of the actual sports organizations. I currently have a list of 57 other groups that I hope to get some information from on subjects ranging from their willingness and requirements for armwrestling to become affiliated with their group to their operational structure that allows them to be recognized by anyone of the IOC related groups.

The IOC Athletes Commission (this is a group that plays an interesting role in the IOC, it seems like a good point of contact for getting information based upon their scope and I like their name, so maybe the Armwrestling Athletes Commission?

Association of Summer Olympic International Federations
Association of International Olympic Winter Sports Federations
General Association of International Sports Federations
United States Olympic Committee
Pan American Sports Organization
International Federation of Associated Wrestling Styles
International Weightlifting Federation
International Association of Athletics Federations
The World Taekwondo Federation (a recent addition to the Olympics)
International Triathlon Union (a recent addition to the Olympics)

[Keith Michel]

You are doing well Simon. But you will have hurry, as I threw up my pizza when the syncronized swimming started. Waste of good pizza!

Sport dancing, now thats a real carpet cutter. I'd hold my breath for the 400 medley lawn mowing and power knitting. God help us.
Or maybe we should start helping ourselves.

Simon I think you are on the right track. Who holds the World Games?

You may have gotten yourself in to Vahalla and a seat next to Oden for this.

[Andrew Fournier]

Simon, Im looking into contacting organizations associated with the olympic commitee too... the first step is discovering the problem....the pinnacle site had listed reasons why armwrestling was not an acceptable sport for the olympics, but that is rather outdated in my opinion...and I believe that no genuine effort to pursue IOC recognition has been made recently. With all these new sports being accepted into the olympics, now is the time to act and potentially get our recognition as well.

[simon]

Andrew that is really the focus of what I am trying to discover, what does it take to get a sport acknowledged, I know that Gord had a ton of information on the subject but what I think we were still left with was the position that according to the IOC we first needed to unify completely, again I find little merit to that logic.

So really right now I am not trying to get us into anything or trying to inquire to anyone about why not us? Moreover I am trying to find out what is the basic standard process for some level of inclusion. I think it wise to distance these discussions from whatever has taken place previously.

[STEVE PHIPPS]

Simon,

I seem to remember that armwrestling was a part of the Goodwill Games in Russia about 10 years ago or so. I don't know who made the contact or how it was started, but I was disapointed to see that it didn't continue, as we held the Goodwill Games in Seattle a few years later.

[Todd Coe]

Dear Simon

I emailed the US Olympic organization at
[e-mail]
asking for assistance with the movement to make armwrestling a Olympic sport. I encourage everyone to email them. Eventually they will respond to someone, and we will be able to move forward

[simon]

Todd the concern with that approach is that I am sure they get it all the time from the members of many sports, not to mention the fact that many people high up in our sport also believe that the IOC may just be sick and tired of the nonsense from arwrestling, meaning for many years the two WAF's had continually claimed that each was the founding and controling interest in the sport subsequently why they have told us to go away until we get our act together.

Hence my thought of removing ourselves from that type of approach direct to the IOC.