Olympic Channel Commissions from ITN

MADRID: The newly launched Olympic Channel has commissioned the docuseries Camps to Champs, which is slated to premiere on December 8.

The four-episode series will be available exclusively on the Olympic Channel digital platform. Camps to Champs sees Olympic athletes travel to refugee camps and areas for the displaced. Each episode focuses on one location and is told from the perspective of an Olympian who shows the impact of outreach programs and grassroots sports activities. The Olympic Channel original series was produced in association with ITN Productions.

The athletes visit refuges in Uganda, Jordan and Greece, as well as internally displaced persons in Colombia. The series features London 2012 silver medalist and modern pentathlete Samantha Murray of Great Britain, Olympic silver medalist in freestyle skiing Gus Kenworthy of the U.S. and two-time Olympic medalist synchronized swimmer Thaïs Henríquez of Spain. In the third episode, Olympic gold medalist rower Sizwe Ndlovu from South Africa meets with Ibrahim Al-Hussien, who competed at the Rio 2016 Paralympic Games in swimming for the Refugee Olympic Team.

“It’s unlike anything I’ve seen in the camp so far,” said Murray of her visit to a holistic Taekwondo academy. “I’ve never seen charity in action like this. This is real life skills in the making for these people, the next generation. They are learning here. Until my experience at the camp, I never realized that [sport] was used in such a completely different way. Sport is an excellent tool for you to grow as a person, to have fun and to forget what is going on around you. I think [the experience] shaped me in a really positive way and I hope to tell as many people as possible about my story and my time in Zaatari.”