Adventure sports ‘positive and enriching’ for women

Mark Pawlak    Adventure Sports & Travel Thoughts, overlandholidays, trekkingholidays     Adventure Sports, mountaineering, olympics, Overlanding, pentathlon, sport, triathlon, women in sports

Adventure sports have never been about who’s the strongest or the most aggressive: it’s all about the experience. Now while there are plenty of competitions to be enjoyed along the way,  for most people it’s about getting out there and having a good time.

In our exclusive interview with Danielle Sellwood, the founder of Sportsister, we find out how women see adventure sports and take a look forward to the London 2012 Olympic Games.

Adventure sports at times have a very macho image, can this put women off trying them?

‘Yes I think so – not all women obviously, but on the whole yes.  I think anything that has an element of adrenaline or potential danger automatically brings to mind macho adrenaline junkies. On the whole women are not so confident and often assume that they would not be fit or strong enough and that they would immediately be way out of their comfort zone.

Danielle Sellwood

The reality is often very different, when women try more extreme sports in the right environment they often surprise themselves, and it can be a really positive and enriching experience. Equally though we hear constantly of women who try a sport with a boyfriend or husband and it all ends up with arguments and a bad experience, mainly because they are too ambitious, the woman loses confidence and they end up hating it!’

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The Olympics Needs You!

Mark Pawlak    Adventure Sports & Travel Thoughts, ash     Adventure Sports, extreme sports, Olympic games, olympics, United Through Sport

Pierre de Coubertin helped launch the modern Olympic movement. And with one sentence set the frame for everything the Olympics stands for:

“The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not winning but taking part; the essential thing in life is not conquering but fighting well.”

It’s the taking part bit that really resonates.

With the 2012 London Olympics just around the bend; isn’t it time we got involved? UK seems stuck in a pre-Christmas lethargy. Winter nights have drawn in, gym membership is on the up and the Olympic vision seems a little clouded at the moment…

In the adventure sports world we don’t care so much about medals, it’s the taking part that counts. But that’s easy for us to say: What we should be doing is reaching out through sport (cringe) bringing it to people who don’t do enough of it (not so cringe) and getting people off their arses by making sport accessible, inclusive and lots of fun. read more

Can extreme sports prove Olympic success starts in school?

Mark Pawlak    Adventure Sports & Travel Thoughts     BMX, coasteering, extreme sports, football, kitesurfing, learning sports, mountain biking, Norway, Olympic games, olympics, parkour, Skiing, united states, Vancouver

Everyone remembers school sports. And unless you were very lucky, there was the very familiar list of ‘choices’ which then filled our Wednesday and Friday afternoons. Only recently have schools started to lighten the curriculum and include a new range of sports – some have gone further still and brought extreme sports to sports afternoon.

Now, there must be a correlation between which sports are taught in schools and the Olympic medal tables? We’ve long seen the summer Olympic tallies dominated by the larger countries. But will this remain true with the integration of extreme sports events?

It’s about support: How much do governments support emerging sports; do they invest in training programs and do they even insist that children take part in sport at all? read more

Competitive team sports: healthy or exclusive?

Ian K    Adventure Sports & Travel Thoughts     Asia, competitive, competitive sport, health, individual, individual sport, junior olympics, olympics, singapore, team sport, youth sport

With the Junior Olympics underway in Singapore, the world’s most talented sporting teens are cutting their teeth in the world of competitive sport. But is it good to push so far, so young?

Where extreme sports demand individual performances, many team sports pit youngsters against each other in a physical battle – and it’s this that puts many children off sport – sometimes for life. read more

Summer X-Games: Who’s taking gold this year?

Mark Pawlak    Adventure Sports & Travel Thoughts     espn, olympics, Skateboarding, tony hawk, winter x games, x games

If you don’t know: the X-Games are the extreme sports World Cup, Olympics, Cup final and Superbowl rolled into one!

This is where skate legend Tony Hawk first pulled off the legendary ’900′ back in 1999 and BMX uber rider Dave Mirra somehow turned a double backflip in 2000.

We just sat in on a press conference with Tony Hawk and friends, and Sandro Dias, one of only a handful of skaters to land a 900 told us he did it at the X-Games the first time he hit the ramp, never even checked it out beforehand: X-Games is where things happen!

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Parkour as an Olympic sport?

Mark Pawlak    Adventure Sports & Travel Thoughts     olympics, paris, parkour, Running

News that Johnny ‘Sticky’ Budden is running from Paris to John O’Groats (1000 miles) is hardly a press stopper. But to hear that he is using the route as a Parkour course is: Hardcore Parkour.

Not only is the new street sport finding its footing here in the UK, its reach could stretch further still. Ask yourself: If BMX made the Olympics, why not Parkour?
OK, jump back: What’s Parkour? Born out of Paris, Parkour is sometimes better known as free running. It involves running on the street, through the street, and over whatever obstacle is set in front of you. read more

Cycling 2010: It’s really gonna roll

Mark Pawlak    Adventure Sports & Travel Thoughts     cycling, olympics

Today a celebrity team, which included Little Britain star David Walliams, comedian Jimmy Carr and celebrity compare Davina McColl, finished a John ‘O’ Groats to Land’s End  Sport Relief Challenge. Whilst the stars may now be resting, cycling as a sport is just getting started; it’s got to be the sport due to expand the fastest this year.

Forget for now the Olympic spandex events and the mountain goat-like achievements of Tour de France riders; cycling is the sport of the masses. Football may have more fans and cricket more wickets, but cycling is the people’s sport. Why? Because ignoring the price of a set of wheels it is free – roads and paths are paid for by taxation; it is inclusive – anyone can learn to ride; it is arguably the most eco-friendly sport there is – it takes cars off the road and let’s face it, despite politicians getting in on the act, it is still cool. read more