The International Adaptive Hockey Festival will bring together 120 teams from 60 cities

From April 25 to April 30, the Adaptive Hockey Festival will be held at the ice arenas of the Sirius Federal Territory. 120 teams from 60 cities will participate in one of the largest events in the field of adaptive sports.

According to the applications received, the festival will bring together 1,350 participants — children and adults with disabilities, military personnel who were injured during a special military operation.

The event is organized by the Adaptive Hockey Federation with the support of the Fonbet DobroFON charity program. This year, the company has allocated 30 million rubles for the festival. On the eve of the competition, Fonbet managing shareholder Valentin Golovanov handed over a check for the specified amount to Dmitry Dronov, President of the Adaptive Hockey Federation.

In 2025, there will be five disciplines in the competition: sledge hockey for children and adults with musculoskeletal disorders (49 teams), 3x3 sledge hockey (15 teams), hockey for the blind and visually impaired (13 teams), special hockey for children with intellectual disabilities (39 teams) and roller hockey sledge hockey, which will be presented at the event for the first time (four teams).

This year, the festival has received international status – for the first time, foreign teams from Kazakhstan and Armenia will take part in it. "In my opinion, this is a very important step, the participation of foreign teams will further expand the geography of friends for the guys, which already covers more and more regions over and over again. At the same time, it is also a big responsibility for the organizing team," said Dmitry Dronov, President of the Adaptive Hockey Federation. He also said that this year "medals, cups and sports components that have been missing in recent years will return to the festival." At the same time, those who fail to win prizes will not be left without awards.

Fonbet managing shareholder Valentin Golovanov, in turn, noted that "with each new year, the festival is becoming more popular; the geography of participants is expanding and new disciplines are being introduced." "This year, the organizers have taken an important step — they have invited foreign teams from Kazakhstan and Armenia. This step will certainly become an incentive for the further development of the competition and the strengthening of friendly relations between all participants, confirming and proving that sport unites," added Golovanov.

Thanks to the format of the festival, over the past seven years, the Adaptive Hockey Federation has been able to involve more than 4,000 children and adults with various forms of disability in hockey classes.

The DobroFON charity program is the general partner of the Adaptive Hockey Festival. Since the first festival, which took place in St. Petersburg in 2018, Fonbet has been supporting the development of children's adaptive hockey. Thanks to this, the company said, many children with different diagnoses got the opportunity to play hockey and compete in tournaments. Moreover, several young hockey players were able to join the reserve of the Russian Paralympic national sledge hockey team.