Extreme Activity Insurance News and Videos Blog

Hangboarding, The Fastest New Winter Sport

We love to search high and wide to bring you the latest extreme sports across the planet, but it seems that one may have slipped underneath our radar. That sport is hangboarding. Invented way back in the early 2000’s in Canada, participants use a uniquely designed rig to fly down snowy mountains, at speeds of up to 100 Kph.

Harnassed in and lying horizontally, hangboarding brings together the feeling and required skills of snowbaording, hand gliding and mountain biking. Sounds fun, you say? Here’s the inventor of this fine sport to tell you more:

Ansell’s Extreme Activity Insurance would love to insure you for a sport like this, as well as the more traditional winter sports such as skiing and snowboarding. Get in touch today!

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Handball Emerges as Top Extreme Olympic Sport

The London Games gave many fringe sports the chance to shine over the past week, on the biggest stage of all. It was fantastic to see such passionate crowds viewing sports that they had never seen, or perhaps even heard of, before the Olympics.

One such sport that gained plenty of mainstream coverage and became a real stand out at The Games was Handball. Admittedly, I’d never played or seen the sport before the Olympics and had wrote it off as a bit of a boring sport. How wrong was I?

The ball travels across the court, end-to-end, as fast as any basketball game I’ve seen and the skill involved when making dummy passes and taking shots was really impressive. These highly tuned skills, blended with the physical power for leaping high into the air to take a shot, or standing your ground when defending, result in a multi-faceted and enthralling sport.

I follwed the British men’s team whilst they were still involved in the competition and considering it was the first time a British team had entered a team into the Olympics, they more than held their own. I wasn’t on my own in watching the Great Britain boys, an estimated 1.5 million people tuned into BBC Three to watch them play against eventual winners, France. This can only bode well for the future legacy of the sport in the country.

The final of the men’s tournament was a captivating matchup between reigning Olympic champions, France and the much-fancied Swedish. The French were regarded as the flair team of the handball competition and the Swedes, the brute force. This Gold medal deciding match was a highly physical encounter and was a close scoring encounter right up to the final whistle.

The final few minutes of the match could not have been more exciting. With France leading by 2 points, they had a player suspended for a defensive infringement and had to hold out for the Gold medal – all hands on deck! They managed to do it, and even get a break away goal for themselves; France won 22-21. Cue rapturous celebrations from not just the players but the brilliant crowd inside the arena too.

The Excitement surrounding sports such as handball, BMX and canoe slalom show that this country does have a passion for other sports, rather than just living for the football at the weekend. Let’s hope this Olympic legacy lives on.

If handball or any other sports have captured your imagination over the 2 week extravanganza of the Olympic games please get in touch to make sure you get yourself and prospective team insured.

Credit images to Flickr users Fimb & Bonnett.

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The BMX Starts Today, as The Olympics get Extreme

Shanaze Reade will be hoping to feed off of the home crowd in the opening of the BMX competition today. The favourite and three-time World Champion will have to wrestle the demons of four years ago to win the coveted Gold medal, where she fatefully crashed on the final corner of the race. With four years more experience and still only 23 years of age, Shanaze must surely be in with a great chance of bagging her first Olympic medal.

She has been rooming with track cycling star Victoria Pendleton and her success in the velodrome will have inspired Shanaze to get out on the BMX track and embrace what will be a fantastic competition in London. You can see the First round of the women’s BMX competition from 3 pm today. Make sure you’re cheering her on for another Extreme Great Britain Medal at London 2012, followingthe Gold and Silver shocks in the canoe slalom!

Here’s the track that Shanaze will be navigating aound this afternoon:

If Shanaze or any other of the BMX’ers inspire you to take up the sport, or you’re more inclined to the Bradley Wiggins style cycling; Get in touch with Ansells today to create a policy tailored to your cycling needs.

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