The 24th edition of the Arctic Winter Games (AWG 2016) ended on a high and all the involved parties returned home with new friendships, goals and plans for the next Arctic Winter Games.
Two years of preparation culminated in five days of competition with 1700 volunteers is indeed a huge achievement for the 2016 Arctic Winter Games Organizing Committee.
Badminton started its competition in the Inussivik Sports Hall and Greenland bagged 15 medals. Greenland´s players Pilunnguaq Hegelund and Nuka Mark Nielsen both went home with three gold medals while their teammates faired equally well in the other categories, capturing 8 out of 10 gold medals.
Greenland Badminton Team
To view the results, click
here.
Another highlight of the AWG 2016 (6-11 March) was the great work done by the umpires during the games. The Organizing Committee requested that the 10 umpires from Greenland to umpire in English and Badminton Kalaallit Nunaat met this request. The umpires delivered flawlessly and had 256 matches in four days.
Line judges and umpires
On the success of the AWG 2016,
Michael Kleist, President of Badminton Kalaallit Nunaat joyfully stated, ´I am proud that both our players, officials and badminton host gave all they had to give our guest a great time and some great badminton. Playing on home crowd was indeed overwhelming especially for the new players but overall, I am very pleased with the results of the AWG 2016. A huge thank you as well to the AWG Badminton Committee for staging a great badminton event in Nuuk´.
The games were declared closed with a spectacular closing ceremony culminating with the biggest firework show in the history at the old part of Nuuk. All in all the AWG 2016 had been a wonderful event that put Greenland´s capital, Nuuk in the news around the world. The next Arctic Winter Games will be in 2018 in South Slave, Northwest Territories, Canada.
To watch some badminton action from AWG 2016, click
here.
To view the photos, click
here.
To know more about Badminton Kalaallit Nunaat, click
here.
Article and photos by Badminton Kalaallit Nunaat