Let the games start!

Inukjuak’s Aftab Khan, Nunavik mission staff for Team Nunavik-Quebec’s badminton team, holds up a sign created by kids in Inukjuak for him to hold March 4, 2012, at the Arctic Winter Games opening ceremonies in Whitehorse, Yukon. The Nunavik team has 53 athletes and six cultural performers.(PHOTO COURTESY OF THE KRG/MATHIEU COUTURE)

This host team member from Yukon shows a lot of enthusiasm as the teams parade into the March 4 opening ceremonies at the Canada Winter Games Centre in Whitehorse, an event which Included dancing and anthems and the screening of official theme song video. The games’ competitions start March 5 and end March 10. (PHOTO COURTESY OF MAKIVIK MAGAZINE)

Nearly 300 young athletes from Nunavut and Nunavik have arrived in Whitehorse, Yukon, where they’ll compete against athletes from around the circumpolar world in the 2012 Arctic Winter Games.

Team Nunavut’s contingent includes 230 athletes, six cultural performers and 48 coaches and managers at the AWG, which also includes athletes and cultural participants from Nunavik, the Northwest Territories, Yukon, northern Alberta, Alaska, Greenland, Yamal (Russia) and Sápmi (Scandinavia).

Team Nunavik numbers 53 athletes, six cultural performers and 11 coaches.

Teams attended the games’ opening ceremonies March 4, with sporting events getting underway March 5 and wrapping up March 10.

Athletes from both teams will participate in roughly a dozen activities at the Whitehorse games, including Arctic sports, Dene games, badminton, basketball, gymnastics, hockey, indoor soccer, speed skating, table tennis, wrestling, volleyball and snowshoeing.

Nunavik fans can follow athletes’ progress through the Team Nunavik–Québec group on Facebook.

Results will also be posted every day at the 2012 AWG website.

You can watch a video of the official AWG song here.

Team Nunavik-Quebec athletes wave the team’s flag on their way into the March 4 opening ceremonies of the 2012 Arctic Winter Games in Whitehorse, Yukon. (PHOTO COURTESY OF THE KRG/ MATHIEU COUTURE)