Jun 20th, 2008
2008 IMBA World Summit in Utah
The 2008 IMBA World Summit started in Park City Wednesday with several pre-conferences and opening ceremonies at the Utah Olympic Park. One of the conferences was for one of our clients Trips for Kids.
Close to 30 people representing 12 Trips for Kids chapters attended, and two attendees even came from as far away as Israel and New Zealand. Both of them want to open Trips for Kids chapters in their respective countries, which would be the first international chapters in the organizations 20 year history. Trips for Kids provides mountain bike rides for at-risk youth.
During the Trips for Kids conference topics such as how to start a chapter, how to find and work with volunteers, and how to effectively fundraise were discussed. Along with Jen Nibley, director of Trips for Kids Utah Valley, and Rick McFerrin of Two Wheel View/Trips for Kids Calgary, Canada, I spoke to the group about how to approach and work with a public relations agency on a pro-bono basis.
IMBA, which stands for the International Mountain Bicycling Association, is a non-profit association whose mission is to “create, enhance and preserve great trail experiences for mountain bikers worldwide.” Every two years, IMBA holds a world-wide conference bringing mountain biking advocates, land managers, ski resort professionals, trailbuilders, park and urban planners, tourism officials and the bike industry together for collaboration, planning, and celebration. This year’s Summit runs from Wednesday, June 18 through Saturday, June 21 at the Marriott-Park City.
During the opening ceremonies held at the Utah Olympic Park, Utah Governor and avid mountain biker, Jon M. Huntsman, Jr. welcomed the crowd. He joked that he was “whizzed” that he had to show up in a suit, instead of casual clothes like everyone else. He’s a big supporter of mountain biking and shared use trails in Utah.
Another highlight of the opening ceremonies was a freestyle arials show at the Utah Olympic Park aerials splash pool performed by “The Flying Aces.” The Flying Aces consists of some of the world’s top freestyle skiers and they flew off the parks artificial turf ski jumps into a huge pool.
IMBA’s Executive Director Mike Van Abel was an honorary Flying Aces team member and started off the show with the first jump. His form wasn’t so hot, but I think he made us all jealous by being the one chosen to get some big air. That’s Mike in the photo above, upside down and wearing a dry suit for the 60 degree water.
As I’m writing this post, it’s Thursday night. I attended some of the seminars during the day, got caught up with some emails in the afternoon, and tonight attended the Mountain Bike Film Festival at the Park City Library. The event was produced by FeedTheHabit.com as a fundraiser for Park City’s Mountain Trails Foundation. The film festival featured a great freeride/downhill movie by The Collective called “Seasons.” You have to see it.
On a side note, at the film festival they raffled off a bunch of prizes (i.e. sunglasses, forks, cranksets, gloves, etc.). The grand prize was a GT Marathon mountain bike. My wife and I were dreaming of winning the bike (Since we hadn’t won anything during the raffle up to that point). But, no such luck. Guess who won it, Melanie Muranaka, Lester Muranaka of Delta 7 Sports’ wife. It’s a small world in the mountain bike community/Utah/PR world (Delta 7 is also one of our clients).
I’ll be up at the IMBA Summit again tomorrow (Friday) for more seminars.