Comment beforehand
Reading our written motivation below, you will see that we found it difficult to nominate Fergil for a single category. Over the past years he was not only a swimmer, but he also organized and contributed to the sport of ice swimming in other significant ways.
As one of the first active swimmers in the sport we would have liked to nominate him in the category of pioneer too. This category does not exist as in some other Swimming Halls of Fame.
In addition to his work as IISA athlete. organizer and contributor we would like to add that he was also very active and successful in Open Water Swimming and Marathon Swimming. He swam and organized as well as contributed to the success of other swimmers as a coach. He came in 2nd and 3rd at The Netherlands championships marathons swimming and was a fierce competitor in the National open water swimming competition.
Nomination for the IISHOF class of 2024
The Board of IISA Netherlands is happy/honored to nominate Fergil Hesterman (from the Netherlands), not only as a swimmer, but also as a successful organizer and as overall contributor to the sport of ice swimming, for the IISHOF class of 2024.
Swimmer
Fergil started his ice swimming journey in 2016 swimming the, at that moment, second fastest Ice Mile. This led to an invitation to the Murmansk Mile in honor of the 100th birthday of the city of Murmansk. This led to participating in the second World Championships of ice swimming organized in Burghausen, Germany (4th place at the 1.000m). His best achievement on the 1000m was his second place at the third World Championships held in Murmansk, Russia.
His other achievements, included winning the 2019 IISA World Cup Series, the highest Ice Mile to this date in the mountains of Lesotho, completing the Ice Triple Crown and his tenth place overall in the 1.000m (second in age group) at the fifth World Championships. All swims can be found in his IISA Bio Link. For all his achievements, Fergil was nominated WOWSA swimmer of the year 2019 and selected as one of the World\'s 50 Most Adventurous Open Water Men in 2019.
Organizer
After competing in the 2017 World Championships, Fergil (now as a L1 and L2 IISA Offcial) decided that he wanted the stimulate the growth of the sport in the Netherlands. His way of doing this was organizing the Amstel Ice Swim (later renamed to Amsterdam Ice Swim) in the city center of Amsterdam. The Amsterdam Ice Swim, now a two day event, grew into one of the largest ice swimming events in the world. The Amsterdam Ice Swim came in third in the WOWSA top 100 events in 2022.
Next to the event itself, Fergil leads a team of experienced ice swimmers, including world championship participants and medal winners, who help new swimmers into ice swimming in weekly practices at the event venue.
Contributor
At the same time as his initiative for the Amsterdam Ice Swim, he also founded IISA Netherlands together with Richard Broer and Christa Hesterman. Fergil, who started as treasurer, later stepped up to be the chairman of IISA Netherlands. We believe that, thanks to all Fergil’s effort, IISA Netherlands is one of the best organized national IISA\'s in the world.
As board member of IISA Netherlands his focus was on promoting the sport in the Netherlands. This included finding and setting up new ice swimming locations across the country, setting up safety guidelines and organizing the National Ice Swimming day.
In his role as board member Fergil also provided solicited and unsolicited advice to the IISA on several topics over the years.
Over the years Fergil used his experience to provide advice and help to several (new) ice swimmers around the world.
As of January 1st 2024 Fergil stepped down as chairman and board member of IISA Netherlands to spend more time with his young family. With this nomination we want to show our appreciation and gratitude for his endless effort and dedication to our sport and to what Fergil has meant to the sport both nationally and internationally thus far.
Kind Regards,
On behalf of IISA Netherlands
Richard Broer
Chairperson
Nomination for the IISHOF class of 2024
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