Pond Wins Its Bid for Championships

With an eye on expanding the sport’s appeal in the United States, the International Badminton Federation on Monday selected the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim to play host to the 2005 world championships.

The facility is already host of the world gymnastics championships in August and the U.S. national gymnastics team trials in 2004.

The announcement was made at this year’s world championships in Birmingham, England. Only once has the event taken place in North America, when Canada was host in 1985.

“This is great news,” said Tim Ryan, general manager of the Pond. “The fact that this is the first time it’s coming to the United States means a lot, especially to the fans here that play the sport. This truly is their Super Bowl.”

Singapore and Denmark were the other finalists. Singapore pulled its bid before the International Badminton Federation council meetings over the weekend.

“Singapore’s withdrawal was the key element,” said David Simon, president of the Los Angeles Sports Council. “Half of the IBF voters are from Asia and a lot of them were taking a wait-and-see attitude when they heard the proposals.

“I think what worked against Denmark was that this is the 14th world championships and they have already hosted three of them.”

Another factor in the selection of the Pond is the large badminton fan base in Orange County, particularly in the large Asian communities in Garden Grove and Westminster.

The Orange County Badminton Club in Orange is one of the largest in the world and has played host to several national and international events since it opened in 1996. It also serves as the training center for the U.S. national team.

“We’ve been working very hard for this,” said Don Chew, president of USA Badminton and owner of the facility. “If [the IBF wants] badminton to have popular support like soccer and tennis, they have to do it in the U.S. This is going to be very exciting.”

Paisan Rangsikitpho, a federation vice president, said the council views the U.S. as an untapped market to increase awareness of the sport.

Badminton has tremendous popularity throughout Asia and parts of Europe but lags behind in the U.S. even though an estimated 1.7 million Americans participate. According to the U.S. Olympic Committee, Southern California has the largest concentration of participants in the U.S. with more than 100,000.

“The IBF would like to see the U.S.A. become a gold medalist in the Olympics,” Rangsikitpho said.

After 2005, the world championships will be held annually except for Olympic years.