The Peninsula
Falah - an athletic falcon emblazoned in the Qatari flag’s maroon colour - was unveiled as the official mascot of the Doha 2019 World Athletics Championships during a ceremony at Qatar Foundation’s Awsaj Academy on the occasion of the annual National Sports Day.
The winning design of the mascot for the Middle East’s first-ever World Athletics Championships was announced following a nationwide competition here yesterday.
The President of the Qatar Olympic Committee (QOC),
H E Sheikh Joaan bin Hamad Al Thani, and a host of current and future Team Qatar athletes were present for the unveiling ceremony.
Also present were over 490 children from a diverse range of local and international schools across Doha, who took part in a series of sports related activities to celebrate the launch of Falah with the help of Team Qatar’s 400m runner Mariam Farid and a group of Aspire Academy’s promising athletes.
The children participated in different inspiring and educational sports activities, coordinated by the IAAF and implemented though the Qatar Athletics Federation and Tsukuba University, who are part of the Tokyo 2020 legacy programme, Sports For Tomorrow.
The University of Tsukunba has cooperated with the IAAF in inspiring young children through sport in this joint programme which started in Rio in 2016 and will conclude in Tokyo in 2020.
The selection of Falah followed a thorough and detailed process in which a total of 21 sketches were submitted to the Local Organising Committee (LOC) from residents of Qatar before a multi-staged voting process took place to decide the winner.
Young ambassadors aged 8-16 were invited to vote for their favourite designs as Team Qatar’s hammer thrower Ashraf Amgad El Seify introduced and explained the sketches to them. The young ambassadors’ vote narrowed the competing designs down to eight. Then QOC President H E Sheikh Joaan bin Hamad Al Thani and LOC staff cut the selection down to a shortlist of three final designs.
Falah. a character with close connections to the Qatari culture and heritage, was finally chosen as the eventual winner.
The winning sketch was designed by Theodore Paul Manuel, a Filipino expat.
Explaining her vote for Falah, nine-year-old Maria from Park House School said: “I really like falcons, so I liked Falah a lot and he also looks like a superhero in his outfit which is what athletes are. So strong, powerful, and fast!”