Important Update From Ski Racing Australia Board – 21 June 2024
Dear SRA Member,
The Ski Racing community is deeply saddened by the passing of Luke, Mat and Amy. Their legacy in our sport will never be forgotten and we pass on our condolences to the families, their friends and team-mates and first responders to these horrific accidents.
The board of Ski Racing Australia (SRA) need to continually assess what is the best interests of the sport, both long and short term to ensure that we continue to evaluate all safety aspects of our sport to protect our members.
As an organisation SRA are working to ensure we learn from these incidents and keep racing safely across Australia.
The Safety Committee, Race Committees and SRA Board have been reviewing all aspects of our sport since 20th March with a timeline to complete recommendations and to deliver the initial findings for wider consultation prior to the end of June 2024. The most recent death has obviously impacted us all and in terms of the project timing it has added to the complexity of the review.
As part of the review ‘socialisation” phase, SRA is setting up yoursay@skiracing.com.au and we encourage all competitors young and old to have input on their experiences on equipment used, falls history and thoughts to ensure that SRA are adding to our database of information to be used to assist the sport to progress.
The current projects revolve around:
⁃ Enhancing the falls register – collecting information from competitors
⁃ Developing a crew competency ranking register
⁃ Skier Equipment including Head and Neck Protection
The Board of SRA has voted to suspend any further racing in Australia until the review is complete and our major stakeholders given time to consider outcomes and provide feedback, before voting on outcomes and setting a return to racing date with any new regulations in place.
SRA are focusing on racing re-commencing as soon as possible to ensure our racing community is back together competing on the water.
We are in close consultation with the working groups set up by the authorities and continue to discuss how SRA are managing the development of the recommendations.
It is however important to note that by large all fatalities within our sport have been at speeds between 70 to 90mph. While it may be likely that lower speeds potentially lower the impact of a fall and therefore reduce injuries, our sport is about racing and to reduce speeds with a desired outcome of reducing injuries, we would need to look at speeds of 70mph and less (approximately the Maritime NSW maximum speed without an exemption). Even so, it is not a guaranteed outcome. It is therefore why SRA is more focused on preventative measures.
Our data suggests that certain skier equipment additions have most likely reduced injuries in falls at varying speeds and conditions. This will be a first step whilst a larger longer running project will look at crash simulations. This will be named project Protect.
SRA will at that point be seeking funding from the Government, WAWA and the IWWF to carry out the simulations. Our current costing estimate for testing is $200,000.00. We will remove the boat levy and introduce a Safety Levy for all events to assist in raising ongoing capital for research and development. All findings will be available to racers and ski racing organisations around the world to further enhance safety within the sport.
This is a difficult period for Ski Racing and we must work together to develop the best outcomes for all, please remember to be respectful for our volunteers who serve on all our committees as we navigate through this period of change.
Regards
SRA Board
