What have we been up to this July? You may have been following news about the recent trip our Team USA players made to Oxford to win the gold in the UK Summer Games, or that World Cup VI will officially be held in Kissimmee, Florida in 2013. We can also tell you that we hosted IQA Quidditch at HP Education Fanon, Inc.’s Ascendio, a convention that ran from July 12-15th.  Quidditch was a definitely a feature that attracted many attendees and even a couple of press outlets.

Image Courtesy http://hp2012.org/

The convention started off with hundreds of wizards and witches coming to the Loews Portofino Bay Hotel in Orlando, FL. HPEF hosted a special event for convention attendees called Night of a Thousand Wizards, which was held on Thursday evening (July 12th) at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. A portion of the ticket proceeds went to the IQA, along with long-time partner the Harry Potter Alliance!

On Friday, July 13th, the IQA met up with the Florida Quidditch Conference and presented TWO quidditch panels:

• Brooms Up! A Day in the Lives of Quidditch Players!  featured Florida Quidditch Conference‘s Bridget Siegel, Dan Miller, Team USA chaser Sean Pagoada, Linsday Fussel, Nick Murado and Nick Wright as panelists. Northeast Regional Director Kristina Moy moderated this panel to give attendees a direct perspective on what it’s like to be a quidditch player and play this fantastic sport. FQC players talked about their first time playing quidditch, what it was like to be part of a tournament and gave a few insider tips for attendees who wanted to get involved or start up a team.Photo Credit: Clay Dockery

• Kristina Moy gave a presentation called, Quidditch Through the 21st Century (It’s Not Just for Wizards!), which highlighted Muggle Quidditch history- how the sport came to be, where it is now, and what we can expect in the future. She informed attendees about different quidditch events that were lined up for the next year  and how people can get involved in the quidditch community and the IQA.

Pick-up quidditch took place on the Villa Piazza of the hotel throughout the weekend. The FQC helped facilitate all the pick-ups, which was well-received by potential players and our enthusiastic specatators, and even a few IQA players from Canada, the West region and ISU.

Fox 35 also made a visit to get some great footage of quidditch, even though it was at 8 AM on Friday. Attendees were more than happy to goof around and run around with brooms between their legs. Check it out at FOX 35 News Orlando

Saturday was FQC’s time to shine in the spotlight. FQC’s Bridget Siegel, Sean Pagoada and Amanda Vaccaro were featured as guests on special Ascendio episode for Transmissions from Atlantis, a sci-fi podcast channel. In the afternoon, FQC played two demo matches to show everyone how our favorite sport was played.

Afterwards, attendees took part in an intense pick-up game. Mugglenet‘s Keith Hawk and the folks from 4geeksmedia (who took some footage of the games and interviewed our IQA players) took a shot to win a victory. Here are some great shots from these matches, with photo credits going to FQC’s Jeremy Sparks and West and Team Canada enthusiast Jill Staniec.

A huge thank you to FQC for all their help in making quidditch a success at Ascendio!

The IQA will be hitting up more conventions including Stan Lee’s Comikaze and New York Comic Con. For more information on these upcoming events, please contact Kristina Moy or Logan Anbinder.