Passionate about the sport, they initiated a judo initiation class at the IOC to offer the possibility to their colleagues to discover more about the sport.
With the support of the IOC Sport Club, Pedro and Achilleas led the very first session of its kind.
For this first edition a total of 17 people, both men and women and from many different departments, participated and had the chance to have their first contact with judo. Thus they could understand the principals and values associated with it and discover what the judo and Olympic values had in common in a practical way.
Pedro Dias said, "It was a huge success and it was decided that we will do some more classes during the year. I’m pretty sure that my colleagues will look at our sport differently now.”
Indeed, thanks to Jigoro Kano, the founder of judo, and Baron Pierre de Coubertin, the father of the modern Olympic Games, who were friends, judo and Olympic values have a lot in common. It is not surprising that the IJF and the IOC have a lot of fights in common, the one for gender equality, the one for preserving the environment and the one for a more peaceful world, to name just a few.
Associated with this great initiative, another event will take place in September, which we will report on soon.