Olympic Opportunities: The IPC President

August 14, 2013

Two years ahead of the Parapan Am Games in Toronto, the president of the International Paralympic Committee, Sir Philip Craven, was in the city to drum up interest in the event.

The media availability was a few blocks from the Yahoo Canada office, so I was dispatched to a conference room to sit in on the proceedings.

The room was filled with reporters much more experienced than me and they were there to ask tough questions.

Because this wasn’t going to be a typical promotional junket.

Six months earlier, in February 2013, Oscar Pistorius, the South African sprinter, shot and killed his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, in his home. While he hadn’t been formally charged yet, he stood accused of being responsible for her death and the sentencing trial was ongoing.

Pistorius wouldn’t have competed in Toronto but his “Blade Runner” story helped pushed parasport into the mainstream consciousness. With his freedom — let alone his career — in question, now what?

Meanwhile, an anti-LGBTQ law passed in Russia ahead of the Sochi 2014 Games was another relevant topic under scrutiny within the international sports world. How would a governing body such as the IPC respond?

Craven sat at the head of a table, a cluster of microphones directly in front of him and answered all questions frankly and firmly. 

He went out of his way to recognize that a woman’s death was at the heart of the Pistorius matter but said he didn’t believe it would “harm the movement.”

As for the Russian law, he said it contravened the IPC’s constitution that prohibits discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and that he was “asking for some answers to some questions at this moment.”

Regardless of the subject, though, he rarely strayed from his broader message: that the Paralympics was about sport, not one man or one country’s actions, no matter how horrifying those actions might be.

After a thorough group interrogation, the schedule moved to one-on-one interviews in a smaller adjacent room. 

Here I was, barely two weeks into my first paid journalism job, about to sit across from the IPC president and press him on the issues of the day.

It wasn’t just the power and influence of his role that made him an intimidating interview for a young reporter. The man’s entire life was inspirational.

At 16, he lost functionality in his legs after a rock climbing accident but wasn’t deterred from a future in sport. Craven represented Great Britain at five Paralympics from 1972 to 1988, primarily in wheelchair basketball. He remained involved in parasport as an administrator and became president of the IPC in 2001, where progress under his leadership had been decisive.

“We celebrated 20 years of the International Paralympic Committee in 2009 and I said at the end of my speech that the biggest achievement of the past eight or nine years has been the transformation of the Paralympic movement from a disability with a big ‘D’ sports movement to an international sports movement,” he said.

In the more intimate setting, Craven was relaxed. While he never completely let his guard down, he was conversational, often concluding his answers with a question of his own. 

I remember he asked for specific feedback about the local response to the upcoming Games. As an interloper to the cause — a school project a few months earlier on the Pan Am Games as a whole was the extent of my coverage history —  my responses were lacking.

But I did my best to keep the flow going until my time with him ran out and it was another reporter’s turn to step inside the room and take their shot.

I had a lot to process on my short walk back to the office. How could I unpack all that had unfolded into an article? 

It was the first time I was truly faced with this writing challenge. When covering an event such as this one where other reporters are present and will be turning around stories, there are two options: write it differently or write it better.

Different means finding an entry point that will stand out from the pack. Better is simple. If the lead item is so obvious it can’t be disputed, then sharpen the writing skills and craft away.

Based on their questions, it seemed clear the other reporters were going to frame their stories with Pistorius or another controversy.

My story would run under the banner of our Canadian sports blog so with editor consultation, I went with different and focused on the Canadian angles that were discussed.

Craven had spotlighted Patrick Anderson, a wheelchair basketball player who led Canada to gold at the 2012 London Paralympics. It was a performance “as great, if not greater, than any by Michael Jordan for the Chicago Bulls,” Craven said.

He also spoke about the importance of the CBC’s parasport programming, citing the coverage from Britain’s ITV for London 2012 as a shining example that when there’s an investment made the ratings will reflect interest from a broad audience.

With role models like Anderson and a more consistent presence, Canada could once again climb up the Paralympic medal boards after they had “slipped a little” in that regard, according to Craven.

And what pulled it all together was his resolute commitment to the greater parasport movement, which was rooted in a pure conviction in what amounted to his life’s work.

“It’s really selling Paralympic sport as great sport; as a fun and unique experience,” he said. ”Sport is in the heart and it’s in the mind. It’s an amazing jewel in the crown when it’s real sport, and I think we’ve got real sport.”

Looking at my story from that day with wisdom gained over subsequent years of writing and editing, it was unremarkable. The important details should’ve been clearer and the structure better organized.

However, the lead sentence is one of the few I’ve written that my mind hasn’t lost to the vestige of time. In fact, I’ve published over 1,000 articles between Yahoo and The Athletic and can’t recall any of them quite like this one.

“There are two things that are required to push forward any movement: passion and money; the former is the heart of the equation but its beat is undoubtedly and unfortunately dulled by a lack of the latter.”

I’d be proud of myself if I came up with that now.