On the next March 11th, the Hotel Hilton Riverside in Nanjing (CINA) will host the FIRS Elective Congress. The delegates, coming from the more than 100 National Federations belonging to FIRS will also have the opportunity to visit the FIRS World Roller Museum, inaugurated in September 2016, and the venues of the 2017 Roller Games. Once more, Nanjing confirms itself as the World Capital of Roller Sports.
Sabatino Aracu (ITA) is again in the running for the highest office in the FIRS, which he is presiding over since 2015. He proposes a team with many new entries and is confident that all of them will be ready to deal with a forthcoming four-year term so challenging: the Olympic Dream, with skateboarding in Tokyo 2020 and the possible introduction of another roller sport in the Buenos Aires 2018 Youth Olympics, and of course, the first two editions of the Roller Games.
There are new faces in the team, but all of them are absolutely not new both to the roller and the sport world: during the past years, all of them gave huge and continuos contribution to the development of the roller sports.
There are no other candidacies to the Presidency: it should maybe read as a common willing to continue to safeguard and further develop in a so important quadrennium for FIRS.
The challenge for the Vice-Presidency is instead quite open and tastes like a South American derby between Mr Ricardo Grin (ARG) - Director of CeNard (National Centre of High Performance Athletics of Argentina) and Vice-president of the Confederación Argentina de Patín - and Mr Moacyr Neuenschwander Junior (BRA), President of the Confederaçao Brasileira de Hoquei e Patinaçao.
Below a short Bio for each of them.
BIOGRAPHIES
| CHAIRMEN | DISCIPLINE | |
Siegfried ZISTLER (GER) March 21st 1959 Mr Zistler’s first approach to the Inline Alpine goes back to the early 2000s when the discipline was not really organized yet. From the very beginning with the Inline Alpine European Committee, the World Inline Alpine Committee and until the recognition by FIRS of the Roller Alpine and Downhill Technical Committee in 2015, Mr Zistler dedicated the last 15 years to the improvement of this discipline.
| FIRS Alpine and Downhill Technical Committee |  |
Nicola GENCHI (ITA) May 27th 1970 Artistic roller skater since 1979 to 1989 - Free, Compulsory and Pairs – Mr Genchi is Italian National Judge since 1989 and FIRS International Judge since 1998. In 2015 he joined the Artistic Technical Committee and dealt with technical seminars for international judges since 2010. He co-designed the software RollArt for the judgement system in the competitions.
| FIRS Artistic Technical Committee |  |
Eddie CHUA (SIN) September 3rd 1966 Mr Chua has been dealing with the Inline freestyle world for ages. He was one of the cofounder of the discipline rules and regulations back to 2003 and has been involved in the inline skating industry for more than 20 years. He organized the WIFS Championship during the last 10 years. He is President of the Singapore Rollersport Federation and a member of the CARS EB.
| FIRS Inline Freestyle Technical Committee |  |
Alberto LASTRUCCI (FRA) July 11th 1953 Mr Lastrucci has been involved in inline hockey since the middle of 90s, when it started to be played in France: as a coach, as a national judge since 1999 and as a member of the French IHT Committee. Since 2009 Mr Portier has called Mr Lastrucci to work at his side in the FIRS IHTC. In 2010, together with Mr Blanchet, they created the World Masters Cup dedicated to Over 38 players.
| FIRS Inline Hockey Technical Committee |  |
Carmelo PANIAGUA MANSO (SPA) July 12th 1958 Former Rink Hockey player and coach, Mr Paniagua has been involved in the roller sports since he was a kid. Elected in 2005 as President of the RFEP, he is also Vicepresident of the Comité Olímpico Español since 2010. He was member of the FIRS Speed TC until 2008 and in 2015 he has been appointed as FIRS Protocol Manager. He is the WRG Barcellona 2019 OC President.
| FIRS Rink Hockey Technical Committee |  |
Fernando REGUEIRO (USA) October 9th 1975 Mr. Regueiro has been involved in Roller Derby for more than 10 years, performing many leadership roles as part of his commitment to improve and grow the sport. He has served the USA Federation as member of the Board of Directors and as Chair of the Technical Committee. He is also the General Manager of the Chicago Red Hots. Before that, he spent 6 years working with Windy City Rollers.
| FIRS Roller Derby Technical Committee |  |
Idroose TAMBARIN (MAL) June 9th 1977 Mr Tambarin entered the roller world at the early 90's in Kuala Lumpur as a roller freestyle skater. He was sponsored by one of the international sports brand to become their ambassador and in 2001, he was given the opportunity to manage a skatepark in one of KL's largest shopping mall in town. In 2010 he formed and established MARS, the governing body for Roller Sports in Malaysia.
| FIRS Roller Freestyle Technical Committee |  |
Olivier PASCAL (FRA) July 25th 1979 Skateboard was his first sport in 1985 and quickly became his passion. Since those days, his board never left him and, nowadays, he rides with his 5 YO son. In 2001 Mr Pascal joined Hurricane action sports co. participating to the development of the FISE by launching the FISE National Series in France and later the FISE World Series. He is now director of international development.
| FIRS Skateboarding Technical Committee |  |
Jorge Ivan ROLDAN PEREZ (COL) November 21st, 1969 Mr Roldan firslty approached the roller world on 1995 as Manager of “Escuelas de iniciacion y formacion deportiva” and Sport Director of the “Liga de Antioquia”. He led the National Speed Technical Committee and in 2005 became Sports Director of the Federacion Colombiana de Patinaje of which he has been also elected as Vice President since 2008. Mr Roldan has been appointed as FIRS STC Chairman in 2014. | FIRS Speed Technical Committee |  |
| CANDIDATE | ROLE | |
Ricardo GRIN (ARG) May 5th, 1952 Mr Grin is a sport leader with vast national and international experience. He has been Sub secretary of Sports, President of his National Speed Committee and of the Federación Porteña de Patín. He has been member of the FIRS STC and President of the Panamerican Roller Sport Confederation Speed Committee. Currently, he is the Director of CeNard (National Centre of High Performance Athletics) and Vice-President of CAP.
| First Vice President |  |
Moacyr Neuenschwander Junior (BRA) February 12th, 1960 Along the past 46 years, Mr Neuenschwander has been an International rink hockey player, head coach and sports manager. President of the Brazilian Confederation of Roller Sports since 2005 (reelected until 2020), he has been also a member of the FIRS Technical Committee of Rink Hockey. As President of the Brazilian Confederation, he organized two world championships: Artistic and Rink Hockey | First Vice President |  |