One of the biggest tasks the new AIDA Board has taken up, is the upgrading of the AIDA Statutes and related document. The first version has made its way to the assembly for reviewing the documents, so lets take a look at them.
Here are the links to the documents. Keep in mind that these are not final yet!
I like these monthly AIDA Board meeting reports, that AIDA is pushing out. It really gives you some sense about some developments and the state of things to come. In the May version it obviously goes deeper into how judgement was reached on the Molchanova issue. But further talk is done about the Okinawa world championships, the new AIDA disciplinary guidelines and statutes. AIDA still needs a lot of people; technical committee, educational committee, IT tasks, but most importantly they need a new treasurer and secretary. What happened to the elected secretary from January, Pia Jerabek? Leave a comment if you know.
Anyway, below the full report to read.
Aida Board Meeting May, 2010
The May Aida Board meeting addressed a difficult and emotional issue. A report from the investigation into the “Ruler of the Deep” competition was presented by a workgroup led by Sports Officer Pim Vermeulen. The other members of the group are; Robert King (attorney, Aida E level judge), Dieter Bauman (Aida judge instructor), Panagiota Balanou (Aida BD level judge), Susan Kluytmans (former Aida secretary, Aida C level judge), and Grant Graves (Aida vice president, Aida judge instructor). The Board unanimously approved the decision reached by the group. Pim published a statement informing the Assembly of the results of the inquiry and subsequent action to be imposed.
In other news; the Board is focusing on the Okinawa World Championship competition. The judges have been selected and Grant Graves is working with the organizers to obtain the doping kits. A general Assembly meeting will take place in Okinawa. Please bring your ideas for the future of Aida to the meeting !
The Disciplinary guideline has been completed and is ready for Assembly vote. It will be an appendix to the Aida Statutes 2010. The Technical committee is finalizing the minor updates for the current Aida competition rules and it will soon be published. The competition guidelines document (checklist) is in the planning stage and if you are interested in helping with this project please contact Greg Piazzola or Ute Gessman. The Educational committee is looking for workgroup members. If you are an experienced instructor with good English and social skills please contact Stavros.
Pim is updating the competition calendar and supporting organizers. The migration to the new site (Aida IT Simo Kurra) is ready for launching as soon as the text has been created. Pim is seeking help with an IT task to find an online form functionality for instructors and printing assistance for Aida education cards. Please contact him for more information regarding these necessary projects.
Aida needs a new treasurer (deadline May 12) and secretary (deadline May 19). These are important Board positions. Anyone with good English and social skills is urged to send an application to the Board. There is also a need for writers and those with IT skills to help with the new website and ongoing projects.
Following the World Championships and the summer approaching; many will be going on vacation. The Board will be slowing down a bit from the fast pace of the last few months but will be working on the 2011 World Championship candidate selections and finding a publicist for Aida in addition to the other ongoing projects.
Again, anyone interested in helping in any of the areas or if you have topics you wish to discuss, please do not hesitate to contact a Board member.
I must say that I’m pretty happy with the new board and their way of communicating into the open. Regular monthly newsletters are exactly what the community needs. So bravo to them. Below the newsletter for the month April. What do you think of the new AIDA Board and how the are handling things?
Aida Newsletter, April 2010
Kimmo Lahtinen, Board President, stated that despite the fact that the situation at the beginning of the year was challenging; progress has been made on many fronts. Monthly meetings have been established and new meeting tools enacted. The statutes and disciplinary guideline are ready for board review. The 2009 accounting has been prepared for Assembly review and the Aida Team world championship competition 2010 judge vote is ready to be launched. Kimmo is most pleased that the Board is still intact and capably working and improving. Committee members have not yet been approved by the Board but will be shortly.
The Technical Committee, led by Greg Piazzola, is finalizing the minority updates (critical corrections only) for the current Aida competition rules. An Aida freediving safety guide document is pending along with a general competition guideline. If you are interested in participating in a workgroup in this area; please contact Greg. Greg, Pim, and Sebastian are working with organizers in Okinawa for the Team World Championship. The website is up and running and the medals have been ordered. The Assembly is reminded to please register their teams for the competition as soon as possible.
Dr.Fitz-Clarke, with the Medical Science Committee, is continuing their agenda for 2010. The committee list includes: seeking international scientists for an advisory panel, developing freediving information packets for physicians, establishing a data base for black out incidents in competitions, and developing a working paper on medical clearance. Additionally, Fred Le Maitre has circulated a research questionnaire for freedivers.
The Disciplinary Committee will present a vote to the Assembly for the Team World competition judges followed by a vote on the DC guidelines, which have now been reviewed. An eventual restructuring of the DC committee is under consideration.
Media Officer Sebastian Naslund, in addition to working on new templates for media releases, has been busy overseeing the aspects of the IT project. A preliminary version of the ranking system has been implemented and the new site navigation system is ready. Volunteer writers are needed to expand the content in the new site.
Pim Vermeulen Sports officer is evaluating and updating the competition calendar and supporting organizers with their competitions. The updated calendar is ready for migration to the new Aida site. He is working with Grant Graves (Vice President) on judging issues and the new rules corrections. Grant is also responsible for record keeping on judge levels. Please submit competition judging experience to Grant to update your level. Aida cards printing is growing at a fast pace and Aida is seeking help from printing companies. Please inform Pim if you have a source for reasonable printing.
Secretary Pia Jerabek finalized a report on the general Aida finances with extensive help and exemplary cooperation from former treasurer, Sebastian Naslund.
Important Reminder! Aida payments are being processed with the account information and addresses, which can be found ad www.aidainternational.org (at FAQ section).
Please remember to include the following information:
The Aida Assembly email list (Yahoo groups) is now overseen by Pia. Assembly members are requested to check the list to ensure correct contact information so Kimmo can update the list.
The Aida competition rules update will be finalized by Grant and Greg. The judge database will be migrated from the old site to the new following the completion of the vote for the 2010 Championship judges. Project manager, Robert King, assisted by Petar Bojovic, Christan Ernest, and Sebastian Naslund, have the Aida statutes version 2010 ready for Board review. After the accounting review is submitted to the Assembly, the Board will arrange for a vote for an official Aida Treasurer.
The next Aida Board meeting is scheduled for May 4, 2010.
If you have any topics that should be discussed by the Board or you would like to volunteer your services to any of the Aida projects – please do not hesitate to contact any of the Board members.
Thought some people would be interested to see the latest developments within AIDA. Below the notes from the last AIDA executive meeting from March 1st and February 7.
There is some real developments going on and hopefully the first actions will soon be visible and noticeable to all from the outside as well. Bravo to the new board and the energy they put in. Now, make it real!
AIDA International has a new website and a new web address. It is not yet made public on the old website. Probably because it’s still work in progress. But it is already looking to good for not mentioning it here.
www.aidainternational.org – so the ‘-’ has disappeared.
Have a look around! What do you think about it?
It has been somewhat quiet since the appointment of the complete new AIDA Board on January 1st. However, this doesn’t mean they are sitting still and doing nothing. I thought it would be interesting to publish the first report from the new AIDA executive board that was sent to the AIDA Assembly, so that everybody knows what is going on. Hopefully they start publishing these kind of things publicly by themselves soon.
What do you think about the letter? Leave your comments below!
Report from the AIDA Executive Board
There will be an Executive Board meeting the first Sunday every month. A report will be delivered to the Assembly after each meeting.
Urgent call to all members! We need to find all missing competition results from 2009. You may have to re-send results that have already been sent in. Please contact: aidaranking@gmail.com and CC: ivo@apnea.cz.
During the first Executive Board meeting (attended by Kimmo, Pia, Greg, Sebastian, Pim (in parts)), Kimmo outlined his vision of how the Executive board should work. He spoke about a lot of autonomy for the commissions. The Executive Board is already talking about new working groups (possible commissions) such as science/medical, media/PR and an IT work group.
The Information Technology Work group, (possible future commission), was formed by the president on the day he was elected. Sebastian Nasland, the media/PR officer is the Executive Board representative on the ITC. So far, the ITC has seen a lot of activity from Jonas A, Simo K, Ivo T, Eric P, also in the group, Paulo N and Peter S. Based on the freedivercentral foundation, Simos work from 2008 and Ivo´s work – this group is well on their way to delivering the first structure of a ranking system.
Pia (secretary) supported by Kimmo are working on making AIDA?s financial situation clear. The services of an accounting firm are being researched. Pia will also be responsible for updating contact details of people important for AIDA. Thus, we will soon be looking through the assembly members database.
A working group aimed at producing a fourth draft of the statutes has been formed. Robert King (attorney from USA) is leading this. Also in this group is Grant Graves (vice president), Christian Ernest (Aida Sweden), Petar Bojovic (attorney), Sebastian Naslund with some other people involved in reviewing the work.
Before the Executive Board meeting Dr. John Fitz-Clarke, Science/Medical Officer, proposed to research if AIDA can setup an AIDA FREEDIVER medical form that can guide doctors when they do medical exams specific to freediving. Dr. Fitz-Clarke would like organizers to report any situation where freedivers with medical problems have slipped through the screening process.
There is also a desire to discuss what is really needed in a competition when it comes to medical competence. Setting the standard too high and we make competitions complicated, too low and we are putting our freedivers at risk. Old procedures will have to be evaluated, since our understanding of blackout, DCS and squeeze has increased recently. We will base our decisions not only on experience, but also on the scientific data available.
Stavros Kastrinakis, Education Officer, and the Education Commission will be involved with these issues as well.
The Science Commission will be building connections with active apnea researchers. There is a lack of communication between scientists due to a potential “competition situation”, perhaps AIDA can bridge this gap in some cases and build a “community feeling”.
Kimmo Lahtinen, President, has ideas about building bridges between AIDA and DAN. Pim Vermeulen, Sport Officer, has already taken initiatives to building closer connections between AIDA and WADA (the doping agency).
Gregory Piazzola, Technical Officer, has already chosen three members for the Technical Commission (TC): Grant Graves (Judge A Instructor), Pim Vermeulen (Judge A), and Florent Pascal (national judge/lawyer). Several experts will be linked to this commission. One issue that the TC will address is how to help judges, organizers, athletes facing «out of rules» situations and report these situations to others judges. Gregory wants to see debate on how to reduce BO during the individual championships. A new version of the rules is planned before the end of the year.
The TC, the Sport Officer, and the Media/PR Commission will be working with the organizers of the Team WC 2010 in Okinawa with the aim of making it a big and successful event.
The Media/PR Commission is looking for volunteers with a background in journalism, graphic design, and video/photography. Igor Liberti, Anneli Pompe, Chris Marshall, and Christian Engelbrecht have offered their services. Peter S. and the ITC will be in close co-operation.
The Sport Officer will as always be working with all competitions, records related subjects, requirements for being in the AIDA Calendar, and result-list checking, etc.
Together with the Responsible for Judges, the Sport Officer will work on judge education and development. Comments on the rules by the judges will be processed by the Sport Officer and the TC for possible development. The Sport Officer and the Responsible for Judges will be in charge of Jury selection for WR attempts.
The Sport Officer will also be working with many outside contacts like doping, insurance, partnerships etc.
Any competitions should be announced to the Sport Officer through calendar@aida-international.org, results can be send to pim.vermeulen@aida-international.org
All payments for ranking, cards, annual fees, etc. are put on hold until the financial responsibilities has been solved.
Next board meeting will be February 7 where every commission will deliver a plan for 2010, to be presented to the Assembly later.
AIDA Executive Board
Finally the results are in for the second votation round for the new AIDA executive board. It’s a good thing that it’s on January 1st so that they can have a good start in the new year.
I must say that I’m pretty happy with the new board! Some excellent people in it who already have a proven record and some fresh minds full with energy. Let’s make this a good AIDA year and good luck with all the work that has to be done!
President
Kimmo LAHTINEN
Vice President
Grant W GRAVES
Secretary
Pia JERABEK
Sport Officer
Pim VERMEULEN
Technical Officer
Gregory PIAZZOLA
Education Officer
Stavros KASTRINAKIS
Medical and Science Officer
John Fitz-Clarke FITZ-CLARKE
Media & PR Officer
Sebastian NÄSLUND
The only position missing in this list is the Treasurer. I wonder what happened with this one, because there was some controversy around it.
It’s official now. The 2010 AIDA Team world championships will take place in Okinawa, Japan from June 30 until July 10. Disciplines will be constant weight, static and dynamic. Organizer Ryuzo Shinomiya will be responsible for the competition together with AIDA Japan.
Full schedule:
Hotel: Tokyo Dai ichi Hotel Okinawa Grand Mer Resort
CWT: Water is 27 degrees and we have 30m vis. (at Maeda Cape)
Pool: 50m pool out side (1.4m depth and heated)
Competition website will be out in January 2010.
Now that the new president is elected together with the secretary, education officer and the science and medical officer, it’s now time to elect the rest of the people to complete the new AIDA Board.
Deadline for voting is December 21st for this second round. It seems that Bill Stromberg also decided not only not to run for president but completely stop working for AIDA after the death threats he has received.
Below the votation list. Expect more info around thee 21st or 22nd with the results.
Subject ONE:
Which of the following two persons would you like to see as AIDA Vice President?
A. Hanli Prinsloo, RSA
B. Grant W Graves, USA
Subject TWO:
Which of the following three persons would you like to see as AIDA Sport Officer:
A. Pim Vermeulen, NED
B. Susan Kluytmans, NED
C. Miguèl Vannieuwenhoven, SUI
Subject THREE:
If under subject two, Vermeulen and Kluytmans get most votes, I would like to se following person as AIDA Sport Officer:
A. Pim Vermeulen, NED
B. Susan Kluytmans, NED
Subject FOUR:
If under subject two, Vermeulen and Vannieuwenhoven get most votes, I would like to se following person as AIDA Sport Officer:
A. Pim Vermeulen, NED
B. Miguèl Vannieuwenhoven, SUI
Subject FIVE:
If under subject two, Kluytmans and Vannieuwenhoven get most votes, I would like to se following person as AIDA Sport Officer:
A. Susan Kluytmans, NED
B. Miguèl Vannieuwenhoven, SUI
If one person gets 50% or more of the votes in subject number TWO, this person gets elected as AIDA Sport Officer directly without we using the subjects 3,4 or 5.
Subject SIX:
Which of the following two persons would you like to see as AIDA Media and PR Officer?
A. Sebastian Naslund, SWE
B. Hanli Prinsloo, RSA
Subject SEVEN:
Which of the following two persons would you like to see as AIDA Technical Officer?
A. Pim Vermeulen, NED
B. Grégory Piazzola, FRA
Subject EIGHT:
If under subject one, Hanli Prinsloo get most votes and become the AIDA Vice President would you accept Sebastian Naslund as the AIDA Media and PR Officer?
A. Yes
B. No
Subject NINE:
If under subject two, Pim Vermeulen get most votes and become the new AIDA Sport Officer, would you accept Grégory Piazzola, FRA as the AIDA Technical Officer?
A. Yes
B. No
Kimmo Lahtinen
First news about the new election after everything went completely wrong. Kimmo Lahtinen from Finland has been elected as new AIDA president. Congratulations to him and good luck with his new heavy job!
Vice presidency will be between Hanli Prinsloo and Grant Graves. Pia Jerabek is the new secretary. Stavros Kastrinakis from Greece is the new education officer and Dr. John R. Fitz-Clark will be the new medical and science officer.
Update: below are the votation results.
Subject ONE:
Who of the following three persons would you like to see as AIDA
President:
A. Panos Lianos, GRE 6 votes
B. Kimmo Lahtinen, FIN 20 votes
Subject TWO:
Who of the following five persons would you like to see as AIDA Vice
President:
A. Hanli Prinsloo, RSA 10 votes
B. Grant W Graves, USA 7 votes
C. Yuzov Vladimir, UKR 1 vote
D. Susan Kluytmans, NED 2 votes
E. Robert King, USA 6 votes
(The three with least votes will be eliminated and the top 2 will go to
a second round. If one person gets 50% or more of the votes, this
person gets elected as AIDA Vice President directly)
Subject THREE:
Would you accept Pia Jerabek, SUI as AIDA Secretary?
A.. Yes 26 votes
B. No 0 votes
Subject FOUR:
Would you accept Stavros Kastrinakis, GRE as AIDA Education Officer?
A. Yes 24 votes
B. No 2 votes
Subject FIVE:
Who of the following three persons would you like to see as AIDA Medical
and
Science Officer?
A. Dr. John R. Fitz-Clark, CAN 19 votes
B. Dr. Ralph Potkin, USA 3 votes
C. Dr. Panagiota Balanou, GRE 4 votes
Subject SIX:
If under subject eight, Fitz-Clark and Potkin get most votes, I would
like to see the following person as AIDA Medical and Science Officer:
A. Dr. John R. Fitz-Clark, CAN 23 votes
B. Dr. Ralph Potkin, USA 2 votes
Subject SEVEN:
If under subject eight, Fitz-Clark and Balanou get most votes, I would
like to see the following person as AIDA Medical and Science Officer:
A. Dr. John R. Fitz-Clark, CAN 20 votes
B. Dr. Panagiota Balanou, GRE 6 votes
Subject EIGHT:
If under subject eight, Potkin and Balanou get most votes, I would like
to see the following person as AIDA Medical and Science Officer:
A. Dr. Ralph Potkin, USA 11 votes
B. Dr. Panagiota Balanou, GRE 15 votes
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