Athletes ready for Arctic Winter Games

Nearly 400 athletes, coaches and support staff from Nunavut and Nunavik are readying for their trip to the 2024 Arctic Winter Games in Alaska’s Mat-Su Valley.

The event will bring together more than 4,000 people from Nunavut, Nunavik, Alaska, the Northwest Territories, Yukon, Greenland, northern Alberta and the Sápmi region of northern Finland, Norway and Sweden from March 10 to 16.

Team Nunavut is sending 300 members including youth athletes, coaches, cultural performers and ambassadors, medical staff and media personnel.

It’s been a bumpy road to the Games for some athletes, who had problems getting passports in time to travel thanks to barriers such as not having access to forms in Inuktitut or difficulty finding a passport photographer in remote communities.

Nunavut MP Lori Idlout raised the issue in the House of Commons in February, which led to Service Canada sending representatives to Nunavut and Nunavik to assist athletes with their applications and fast-track the approvals.

Idlout announced Wednesday that all Nunavut athletes now have their passports approved.

“This is a huge relief for families, as dozens of applications were sitting in bureaucratic limbo,” she said in a news release.

Nunavut will compete in 13 events this year including hockey, table tennis, short-track speedskating, badminton, basketball, volleyball, Arctic sports, Dene games, futsal, wrestling, curling, cross-country skiing and figure skating.

Some events to watch this year will be hockey, where the male under-18 team hopes to repeat its historic gold-medal win from 2023 when the Games were held Wood Buffalo, Alta., as well as the small, three-member figure skating team.

The Inuksuk Drum Dancers will represent Nunavut at the cultural showcase. Team Nunavut’s flag bearer, who will lead athletes at the opening ceremonies, is badminton player Iris Sowdluapik from Pangnirtung.

Nunavik, competing for the 16th year, will go head-to-head with Nunavut in four sports — table tennis, badminton, Arctic sports and Dene games — and will compete in snowshoeing.

Team Nunavik consists of 54 athletes and six cultural performers from the circus group Cirqiniq, along with 11 coaches and additional mission staff.

The participants will gather in Kuujjuaq for their official send-off party Friday, where the team’s flag bearer will be announced.

“I’m very proud of our athletes and performers who have overcome many challenges to travel to the Mat-Su 2024 Arctic Winter Games in Alaska,” said Kativik Regional Government chairperson Hilda Snowball in a statement.

“They are amazing role models for other Inuit youth, and proof of what Nunavimmiut can achieve when we work together and set our minds, muscles and talents to the task. Go Nunavik Go!”

Meanwhile, on Wednesday the Government of Nunavut warned of social media scams related to the Arctic Winter Games, specifically fraudulent websites demanding a fee to livestream the Games.

“This is an attempt to steal your personal information, including credit card details, and can lead to identity theft and fraudulent credit charges,” GN spokesperson Heather Grant said in a statement.

An online broadcast of the games is available to the public free of charge at

www.awg2024.org/livestream.

The Games are scheduled to happen every two years. However, the 2020 Games were cancelled and 2022 Games were delayed for one year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Nunatsiaq News will have daily coverage of this year’s event.