The 2010 Gay Games (Gay Games VIII) were an international

multi-sport event A multi-sport event is an organized sporting event, often held over multiple days, featuring competition in many different sports among organized teams of athletes from (mostly) nation-states. The first major, modern, multi-sport event of interna ...

and cultural gathering organized by, and specifically for lesbian,

gay ''Gay'' is a term that primarily refers to a homosexual person or the trait of being homosexual. The term originally meant 'carefree', 'cheerful', or 'bright and showy'. While scant usage referring to male homosexuality dates to the late 1 ...

, bisexual, and

transgender A transgender (often abbreviated as trans) person is someone whose gender identity or gender expression does not correspond with their sex assigned at birth. Many transgender people experience dysphoria, which they seek to alleviate through ...

(

LGBT ' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity. The LGBT term ...

) athletes, artists and musicians. It was held from July 31 to August 7, 2010 in

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.6 millio ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

Bidding process

On 16 March 2005, the Federation of Gay Games (FGG) announced that

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu and xh, eGoli ), colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, or "The City of Gold", is the largest city in South Africa, classified as a megacity, and is one of the 100 largest urban areas in the world. According to Dem ...

, and

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

were the official candidate cities for Gay Games VIII in 2010. Cologne was elected in the FGG annual meeting in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

on 13 November 2005. The 2010 Games marked the first time the Games were held in Germany, and the second time in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...

(

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population of 907,976 within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban ar ...

hosted in 1998). In the 2010 Gay Games was Sir Elton John was announced as the ambassador of the games on November 7.

Participating nations

Athletes from 70 countries participated at the 2010 Gay Games. The most athletes came from Germany (2,955), followed by the United States (2,215), the United Kingdom (841), the Netherlands (658) and France (524).

Opening ceremony

German Foreign Minister

Guido Westerwelle Guido Westerwelle (; 27 December 1961 – 18 March 2016) was a German politician who served as Foreign Minister in the second cabinet of Chancellor Angela Merkel and Vice-Chancellor of Germany from 2009 to 2011, being the first openly gay person ...

(who was openly gay) attended the opening ceremony on 31 July 2010. The Official Anthem for the 2010 Gay Games was "Facing a Miracle" by

Taylor Dayne Taylor Dayne (born Leslie Wunderman; March 7, 1962) is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. She rose to fame in 1987 after her debut single " Tell It to My Heart". Dayne achieved six additional U.S. top-10 singles, including "Love Will ...

in which she performed live. Also Sir Elton John was announced as an ambassador of the games on November 7.

Events

The event featured 35 sports, accompanied by community and cultural events throughout Cologne and the surrounding area. The 35 disciplines consisted of Badminton, Basketball, Beach-Volleyball, Bodybuilding (Physique), Bowling, Bridge, Chess, Cycling, DanceSport, Diving, Field Hockey, Figure Skating, Golf, Handball, Ice Hockey, Inline Speed Skating, Martial Arts, Pool-Billiards, Powerlifting, Road Races incl. Marathon, Sailing, Soccer (Football), Softball, Sport Climbing, Sport Shooting, Squash, Swimming, Synchronized Swimming, Table Tennis, Tennis, Track and Field Triathlon, Volleyball, Water Polo and Wrestling. Soccer (football) had the largest participation with more than 1,000 male and female competitors.Scally, Derek. "One Hundred Irish Go for Gold at Gay Games." ''Irish Times'', August 7, 2010, pp. 4''.''

References

External links

Gay Games VIII official Homepage
(English)

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gay Games 2010 2010 2010 in multi-sport events 2010 in German sport