This Athlete Wants to Bring His Indigenous Sport to the Olympics

Now 33 years old and living in Juneau, Alaska, Worl continues to coach, compete, and serve as a major advocate of the sport. He spoke to Men’s Health about what sets the Inuit Games apart from mainstream athletics and fitness, and his hopes to bring a demonstration of the sport (essentially, an exhibition to show how the Games work) to the 2028 Olympics.

MEN’S HEALTH: How did you get started in the Inuit Games?

KYLE WORL: It goes back to my dad, Rod Worl, who was an athlete in Arctic Sports [also known as Indigenous Games or Inuit Games] in the ’80s and ’90s. I was very young when he was competing so I was exposed at a very young age. I was in high school when I actually joined the sport myself. I was a very quiet, reserved type of teenager. Even though I was exposed to this sport at a young age, it took me a long time to find the confidence to try it out. I had some mentors that really encouraged me and I fell in love with [the sport] at the first practice.

I did [other] sports here and there when I was young—swimming, soccer, and a few others—I just never connected to them. Maybe it was because I was shy or it was hard for me to connect to other youth that were in the sport. But when I joined the Native games, it was something different for me. I felt a sense of belonging and identity from the very beginning.

MH: How does your cultural background contribute to your work in coaching and advocacy for the Inuit Games?

KW: I have ancestral linkage to these games which were created hundreds, maybe even thousands of years ago by the Inuit people of the Arctic. They were traditionally used for hunting and survival skills, and they’ve grown into a modern sport that’s played beyond the Arctic by non-Indigenous people as well. This isn’t like mainstream sports; it’s an Indigenous sport and it holds tribal values and important lessons that are relevant for all Indigenous people of the north.

Up here in Alaska, we’re not farming. We’re subsistence people. We live off the land, fishing, and gathering, so that’s what these games are based on. The Arctic games are about community, coming together, supporting each other, reaching your personal best. I think that’s a much healthier mentality for a sport. I mentioned how I couldn’t connect with a lot of mainstream sports, but once I got into Arctic games, it just felt like the atmosphere was much more community-based. Everyone was there to support each other.

MH: When did you start working within your community to promote the Inuit Games?

KW: I was born in Fairbanks, then went to high school and college in Anchorage, and then moved to Juneau, where I currently live. Compared to other places in the United States, they’re all pretty small cities. But within Alaska, those are the urban centers. I do consider myself an urban Indigenous person and so these games were how I was able to connect further with my Indigenous identity and community. In these urban centers like Anchorage, Fairbanks, or Juneau, we do make up a good portion of the population, but we are a minority, and it can be difficult to connect with your identity.

Growing up as a teenager, I had some shame around being Native. It wasn’t something that I shared because there were a lot of negative stereotypes like homelessness and alcoholism. I just wanted to be ambiguous, even though my family raised me to be proud of who I was. It wasn’t until I joined the Native Games that I was able to connect through my peers. I saw other young Indigenous youth that were proud to be Native, and that was eye-opening for me. I remember my early practices where the other students were talking about being Native: food, culture, language, history. It was like, “Oh, these are the things we can share with each other and be excited about.” That was just a whole different setting for me. My Indigenous identity was no longer something I had to hide away and feel shame—it could be something I share openly.

Through that space, I began to learn a new history of Indigenous people because, in school, the general teaching of Native American history is that Indigenous people are a disappearing people that had atrocities committed against them. We’re victims in this history. Through interacting with other students and being a part of the Alaska Native Heritage Center in Anchorage, there was an education about Indigenous identity from the Indigenous perspective and that perspective is one of resilience and adaptability and joy and strength and courage. I started learning the Tlingit language, and that’s actually why I moved to Juneau… to be closer to Tlingit speakers and elders. Once I moved there, I got involved working with the tribe. They wanted me to help lead a youth wellness program. We believe that using Indigenous Games is a really healthy tool and outlet.

MH: What’s the biggest fitness challenge for your community?

KW: How you define fitness is different; there are different perspectives. For Indigenous people, fitness was about living off the land. It was about being able to be a good hunter, to travel, to carry heavy loads, to be skillful in the hunt or when fishing or gathering. Traditionally, that was what fitness meant to our people.

Because our communities have experienced so much change over the last 200 years, we aren’t all connected with our traditional lifestyle in the same way. There’s been a tremendous shift in our lifestyles and we are still trying to adapt to living in two worlds: this modern world and our Indigenous identity. Our people are still in a transition and still in a healing period where, sometimes, it’s more like survival mode. In the modern sense of the word, a lot of us don’t have the ability to go to the gym every day. I’ve been privileged to make it to the gym and have a regular running routine, but that’s definitely a challenge in our communities.

MH: What do you think would help make the fitness industry more equitable?

KW: In the work I do, it’s about promoting different types of fitness. The awareness and acknowledgement of the diversity of fitness and sport and people: There’s no one way to fitness. There’s no one body type. Even in our Arctic Games, there are different games that suit different body types. We have agility games to help you if you’re more lanky and lean, and we have strength games which are going to help you be more heavyset and larger.

Fitness looks different for different people and purposes. The purpose of fitness for a hunter is about providing for their community, and that’s a whole different type of fitness than someone going just for the aesthetic look. For Indigenous people, it’s not just about yourself or just looking good or feeling good. It’s about how you can serve your greater community.

MH: What do you see envision for the future of the Inuit Games?

KW: My vision is to see the Inuit Games in the Olympics. Getting it into the North American Indigenous Games [earlier this year] was a step in that direction and there’s a long way to go. We’re hoping to go to the Olympics in 2028 [in Los Angeles] as a demonstration. My dad was part of the team that demonstrated the Inuit Arctic Games at the Olympics [in the ’80s], so I’m hoping to work towards getting it recognized as an international sport. It’s really amazing to see that lacrosse, an indigenous sport, will be in the 2028 Olympics. There’s a momentum today to recognize the diversity of sports—and Inuit Games is another up-and-coming sport to the international scene that I would like to help promote. It’s a pretty lofty goal in what it takes [to get the sport to the Olympics], but that’s what I’m here to do.

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