The International Quidditch Association, a nonprofit dedicated to spreading the magic of Harry Potter and athletic communities around the world, hosted on July 8-9 its equivalent to the 2012 Summer Olympics. Theirs are in the county of Oxfordshire, about 50 miles from London.
Cameron Kim, a rising junior who is studying in the Duke in Oxford program this summer, is an officer in Duke’s Quidditch Club and is one of the IQA organizers. He writes in about the event:
The United States won the tournament! France came in second place, followed by Australia, then Canada, and the United Kingdom was in last place. The tournament was a huge success, BBC and Reuters were able to cover a story on it, and we expect CNN to report on the games later this week.
We had five countries represented at the Summer Games: USA, United Kingdom, Canada, France, and Australia. My role in the tournament was with officiating and organizing referees for the tournament. I am the Director of Referee Development for the IQA, and I am working to establish a referee training program for officials across the world. Here at Oxford was my first in-person trial of the referee training, as I work with American and British referees to train and prepare for this grand tournament. It's quite great timing, as the Olympic torch will be arriving on the 9th of July, and the IQA will be hosting the finals match in conjunction with the city of Oxford to commemorate the arrival of the torch and incite excitement about Quidditch as an international sport. Maybe we're not the next Olympics event to be added, but we can sure try, and at least get the global community excited about this magical sport. It's been very exciting for me to be a part of this and just coincidentally be a part of the Duke in Oxford program. While I'm here, I am studying Shakespearean literature, but I am majoring in biomedical engineering and mathematics with a certificate in Genome Sciences & Policy, so I've already been exposed to a different environment than what I'm used to back on Duke's campus. And to be able to even stretch out of my comfort zone a little more and be able to train and officiate the first ever IQA Summer Games provided me with opportunities I never thought imaginable.
For the IQA's website about the Summer Games.
For Duke Magazine’s article on Duke Quidditch.