Today, I have the honor and pleasure to introduce to you the new President of the IUF: congratulations Maksym Siegieńczuk!

We are all happy that Maksym decided to run for the office; in our meeting today he was elected unanimously.

As my time as the president is now coming to an end, I would like to thank you all today. It was always an honor for me to be your president, the unicycling community was and is something special. Maintaining this spirit has always been a special concern for me and I am sure that Maksym will continue the office in this sense. Don’t worry, he still has many new ideas in his quiver as well!

I am happy to hand over the office into good hands and will now slowly but surely withdraw myself from the active work and only take care of some smaller projects of the heart. I could also include a long list of names who have made my time a great one here, but as you’ll always forget someone this way anyway 😊 I’ll make it short: Thank you unicycling community for so many wonderful years!!!

However, I would also like to take this opportunity to look for new board members. If you could imagine to actively work in the IUF Board, you can apply now. To do so, send your application and a statement on why you would like to be a member of the board to contact@unicycling.org until January 15th. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me or any other board member. Due to our international structure however, it would be extremely helpful if you had a relatively good command of English at least. The work in the board can sometimes be tough and tedious and is about bureaucratic things every now and then, but you can also move a lot and bring our sport forward. If this appeals to you, apply now!

Finally, I wish you all a peaceful and reflective holiday season. 2020 has been a difficult year for everyone, everyone had to limit themselves socially a lot, some had to accept strong financial losses and some even lost relatives and/or friends, making it a truly horrible year.

In the unicycling community however, I could see that even in this situation, we tried to get through the year together, stay positive and work on great projects for which I would like to express my respect and gratitude. I am confident that in 2021, we can slowly but surely return to our normal lives and even enjoy the first small events in summer. And in 2022, we can finally celebrate the long awaited Unicon 20 together exactly the way we all wish to celebrate it.

Goodbye and blessed holidays from my side and all the best Maksym