FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
22 July 2002

FANS AWAY FROM STADIUMS HAVE ACCESS TO
WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP GAMES IN PROGRESS

This is the seventh in a series of eight releases leading up to the International Softball Federation's X Women's World Championship, to be played July 26 - August 4 in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, from which four teams will qualify for the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. Today's feature looks at the different types of broadcasts that will be done during the event. (NOTE: The planned sixth release in this series was supplanted by the announcement of Cuba withdrawing and the Dominican Republic being named as their replacement. That as well as the first five releases in this series of eight can be viewed from the Press Releases page on the ISF's official website.)

Some fans in the Saskatoon area won't be able to get to all of the games in the ISF X Women's World Championship, likely due to work or other prior commitments. For them, the ISF is pleased to announce live broadcasts by a local radio station. Some others won't be able to make it to the competition playing out at Bob Van Impe Stadium or Gordon Howe Park because while it's true they too will likely be working, many of them will be a thousand or few thousand miles away. For those people, there is the internet.

The International Softball Federation announced today that CJWW-AM (600) in Saskatoon will broadcast five games live from the event that begins later this week.

"This is important to us because it helps promote not only our sport, but one of our marquee events," said ISF President Don Porter. "I'm sure that the listeners will enjoy CJWW's broadcasts and feel the excitement that our Women's World Championship creates."

CJWW General Manager Vic Dubois added, "I am excited about offering everyone who cannot attend the games in person the opportunity to follow Canada's team on the radio throughout the tournament."

The Canadian team will be a part of each of the five broadcasts scheduled for (all listed as local Saskatoon time): July 26 vs. Chinese Taipei (7:00 p.m.), July 27 vs. Russia (8:30 p.m.), July 28 vs. United States (3:30 p.m.), July 29 vs. Czech Republic (6:30 p.m.), and July 30 vs. Italy (8:30 p.m.). CJWW Sports Director Les Lazaruk will handle the play-by-play duties. Any playoff games involving Team Canada would also be done by CJWW*.

In addition, fans can follow a minimum of six more games through play-by-play in text format, as the ASA (Amateur Softball Association)/USA Softball will be doing all of its teams games live on their website, www.softball.org.

The International Softball Federation, celebrating its 40th anniversary in 2002, is the governing body of softball internationally as recognized by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the General Association of International Sports Federations (GAISF). The ISF organizes and conducts world championship competition in women's and men's fast pitch, junior women's and men's fast pitch, women's, men's, and coed slow pitch, and women's and men's modified pitch. Softball (women's fast pitch) made its Olympic debut at the 1996 Games in Atlanta. There are 125 affiliated countries in the ISF and over 40 million participants in the sport worldwide.

For more information, please contact ISF Director of Communications Bruce Wawrzyniak at brucew@internationalsoftball.com or (813) 864-0100, ext. 229.