Feb 02 - An Exciting Year For Special Olympics Gibraltar

Written on 02 February 2017.

2017 promises to be a great year for Special Olympics Gibraltar. The Special Olympics World Winter Games will be taking place in Austria in March closely followed by Gibraltar’s own National Games, and also the Straits Games in the Summer.

In addition, this year, Special Olympics footballers will be competing against other teams on home turf for the Gareth Cowin Trophy having won the competition in grand style in the Isle of Man last year. This is all happening alongside the regular training sessions, futsal matches and other activities held every week on the Rock.

World Winter Games
Special Olympics Gibraltar athletes are hard in training at the moment for the Special Olympics World Winter Games which are held every four years and take place this year in Austria from 14th to 25th March.

Gibraltar will be competing with 2,700 athletes from 107 nations. In all there are nine sports – Gibraltar’s squad of 15 athletes will be competing in three of them.

Snowshoeing is a sport which Gibraltar has excelled at in the past and will be hoping to do well in again this year under Head Coach Paola Poggio with three athletes competing. Training has been in progress on local beaches in the last few months and expectations are high. However the largest contingent of the squad will be competing in floor ball which is a new sport for Gibraltar. It is a game which is similar to hockey, played with plastic racquets and a light ball but which was developed in the 1970's. Under Head Coach Kellianne Peliza, ten athletes have been training hard including several younger athletes who have not been away with Special Olympics before.

The third sport is another new one for Gibraltar: alpine skiing! Two Gibraltarian skiers have been training in Sierra Nevada under coach Thomas Johansson (far left) and despite it being a new experience for them and a great challenge, it has proved highly rewarding and created a great deal of interest. The success of local athletes has not gone unnoticed on the world stage and a team from ESPN TV channel visited the Rock recently to put together a report on athlete Samuel Santos (left) which will be broadcast worldwide when the games are on.

Samuel will be competing in the alpine skiing event in Austria having won a gold medal in the World Summer Games two years ago in Los Angeles in another new sport for Special Olympics Gibraltar: open water swimming.

Whilst the games in Austria are considerably easier to travel to than the last games in Los Angeles, the expense involved in the trip, and especially in training in new sports such as skiing, has inevitably put a strain on resources. Special Olympics Gibraltar has been busy fund raising towards the cost of travel, kit etc and they are currently launching their "sponsor an athlete" scheme whereby individual or corporate sponsors can sponsor particular athletes, link themselves to coverage of that athlete, follow their progress and share in their success while supporting a worthy cause. For further information please contact Annie Risso on 20050764, email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. , or Marisa Henrich on 54008179, email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

National Games
The Special Olympics Gibraltar National Games will be held again this year in the summer. This annual event has been taking place since 1985 and gives athletes a chance to demonstrate their skills in front of their friends, honoured guests and relatives in familiar surroundings. Along with an entertaining opening ceremony, foreign competitors will be invited again to compete in athletics, football and swimming events. Details are still being finalised and these have yet to be confirmed but teams from the Isle of Man and Barbate are regular attendees.

Straits Games

Special Olympics Gibraltar will once more participate and support the Straits Games which fall on the 3^rd June 2017 and will be held in Los Barrios, Spain. They will be competing in football, athletics and swimming events.

Gareth Cowin Trophy
The Gareth Cowin trophy was first competed for in Liverpool in May 2014 where a 5-a-side team from Special Olympics Gibraltar was invited to play against nine other teams from north west England and the Isle of Man. The tournament was held, and has been repeated each year since, in honour of Gareth Cowin, a popular athlete from Special Olympics Isle of Man who sadly passed away at the Winter Games in South Korea in 2013. Last year the Gibraltarian team was victorious in an exciting final against the Isle of Man and won the right to host the tournament in 2017. Special Olympics Gibraltar says it looks forward to inviting various soccer opponents to the Rock this year for what promises to be a fiercely fought competition. Dates and details to be confirmed.