Australian fridgie to compete at Chillventa

Australian refrigeration and air conditioning technician Tom Clancy is set to travel to Germany in October, where he will compete in the WorldSkills international competition at the giant Chillventa exhibition.

The scheduling of the competition came as welcome news for Clancy and the other international competitors, who were due to battle it out in Shanghai until that event was cancelled due to the pandemic. In some ways, it has been an improvement. In Shanghai, the teams would have been limited by extremely strict COVID-19 protocols, while in Germany, they will be free to move around and will compete in front of the public. Also, they will be smack bang in the middle in one of the largest HVAC&R events in the world.

Clancy says he is excited about the experience.

“It’s an honour to be representing Australia at a refrigeration expo over in Germany,” he says. “I think Chillventa itself is five times as big as ARBS, so I’m thrilled to get to go.”

Clancy admits that the past months have been a rollercoaster.

“At one point the competition wasn’t going to go ahead until 2024, and I didn’t really want to compete in 2024. But the countries agreed [to reorganise the event] and said Germany was a great idea.”

Luckily for Clancy, the decision was made quickly, so there was no major break in his training schedule. Last week he travelled from his home in Perth to Melbourne for a test run at ARBS. Given that previous competitions were held behind closed doors because of COVID-19, it was the first time Clancy had performed in front of a crowd. But he says the audience did not faze him.

“You just go into your own zone and get the work done. All your work normally is in front of people, so you just keep doing a good job, keep your work to a high standard and you can’t go wrong.”

And although Clancy acknowledges that the international competition will be held on an even bigger stage, he says he is looking forward to it.

“There’s a fair bit of pressure,” he says, “but nothing you can’t handle at the end of the day.”

The WorldSkills Competition 2022 Special Edition for Refrigeration and air conditioning will take place at Messe Nürnberg, Nuremberg, Germany from October 10–13, 2022 as part of Chillventa.