Softball arrives in Lausanne with high-profile Team of Olympians

Press Release International Softball Federation

Michele Smith – “The Olympic Games has been the pinnacle of competition for softball players across the world.”

Lausanne, (Switzerland); 12th June 2009: An all-star international BackSoftball team that includes Olympians from three continents has arrived here today to make final preparations for a key International Olympic Committee presentation for softball’s return to the Olympic Program in 2016.

USA Olympic softball gold medalists Michele Smith (1996 & 2000) and Jessica Mendoza (2004) (silver in ’08) are joined by 2008 softball Olympians Danielle Stewart (bronze medal, Australia) and Rubilena Rojas (Venezuela).  Two other international softball athletes, both BackSoftball Athlete Ambassadors, are along as well.  They are Gergana Handjiyska, who is also the Bulgarian Softball Federation’s secretary general, and Lynn Alexander, who will also coach her country’s team (South Africa) at the Youth World Cup in Prague in August.

In addition, BackSoftball Task Force Co-Chairs Donna de Varona (two-time Olympic gold medalist in swimming) and Dale McMann are here, as are International Softball Federation President Don Porter, ISF Deputy Secretary General Ms. Low Beng Choo (Malaysia) and ISF Director General Toma Malikoff.

The team will now undergo rigorous preparations for Monday’s presentation to the IOC Executive Board, when they plan to convey, among other highlights, the development of softball across the globe including initiatives to promote the sport in under-developed and troubled communities.

Olympian Michele Smith said, “The Olympic Games has been the pinnacle of competition for hundreds of softball players across the world and the competition in Beijing last summer was one of the highlights of the Games – and it was doping-free once again!

“But softball goes far beyond that. The ISF has done so much to promote the sport and it now touches the lives of people young and old across the world, and because it’s easy to learn and inexpensive to play, it’s making a real impact.”

Task Force Co-Chair Donna de Varona said, “The ISF leadership and our global BackSoftball Ambassadors are prepared and excited to pitch softball to the members of the IOC Executive Board.  This is softball’s last and most important official presentation before the decision will be made as to whether or not softball returns to the Olympic program in 2016.  Our team is confident that softball exemplifies the best qualities of the Olympic movement.  It is inclusive, global, adaptable, and lends itself to a multitude of initiatives seeking to teach important sports, health, and peacemaking lessons.

“The fact that the ISF has an office here in Lausanne demonstrates softball’s growing popularity and commitment to those softball players and leaders worldwide who are eager to rejoin the Olympic movement.  I am convinced that the BackSoftball team can fully communicate the tremendous virtues the sport promotes.”

Softball was first featured in the Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta in 1996 and last year’s competition in Beijing was hugely successful with a total attendance close to 180,000 and a continuation of the sport’s excellent record of no positive doping tests at any of the Olympics since the sport’s debut on the world’s stage 12 years earlier.

A final decision on which sports will be added to the current roster of 26 at the 2016 Summer Olympic Games will be made at the 121st IOC Session in Copenhagen in October this year.