Winter Olympics 2018Winter Sports

PYEONGCHANG will stage the 2018 Winter Olympics – after beating off rivals Munich and Annecy in convincing style.

SUCCESS: IOC president Jacques Rogge announces that Pyeongchang, long-time favourites, have landed the 2018 Winter Olympics ahead of European rivals Munich and Annecy

Only one vote of the IOC’s 95 eligible members was required for the Korean city to gain the majority of support they needed in Durban.

Pyeongchang’s margin of victory was convincing – the first time since Salt Lake City trumped Budapest for the 2002 winter Games that a candidate has won in the first round.

They picked up 63 of the 95 votes cast, leaching Munich on 25 and Annecy with a solitary and somewhat embarrassing eight.

It is a happy ending to a story that began ten years ago – with the city unsuccessfully bidding to stage both the 2010 and 2014 Games, losing out by three votes to Vancouver and then four votes to Sochi, despite winning the first round of voting on both occasions.

“Pyeongchang’s inspiring project sets out to have the heart of the Olympic Winter Games beating in the mountains,” said IOC president Jacques Rogge. 

“The South Korean project will leave a tremendous legacy as Pyeongchang will become a new winter sports hub in Asia, allowing athletes and young generations to practise winter sports at home, be exposed to the Olympic values of excellence, friendship, and respect, and pursue their Olympic dream. 

“I congratulate Pyeongchang. The IOC looks forward to collaborating with them over the next seven years.”

Located 110 miles east of Seoul, the hosts of the 1988 summer Games, Pyeongchang will be only the third Asian city to host the winter event – following Sapporo in 1972 and Nagano in 1998.

They certainly learned the lessons from previous failures – presenting an impressive vision that wasn’t drawn on plans but there to see already in bricks and mortar.

Seven of the 13 venues have already been completed and it is hoped the area will now become the ‘winter sports hub of Asia’.

Korean officials have spent £20 million promoting their credentials and after two unsuccessful campaigns have worked hard to raise awareness of the city, which is located in the Gangwon Province, one of Korea’s less developed regions.

And no-one now confuses the Pyeongchang with Pyongyang, the capital of the reclusive, communist North Korea.

Several factors clearly resonated with the IOC’s membership – with the 45 minute presentation of their bid team also trumping their European rivals in both style and substance and even humour.

Firstly the compact nature of the bid – 30 minutes is the maximum distance between venues, which contrasts favourably with the three hours it took to travel between Vancouver and the snow resort of Whistler during last year’s Games.

Secondly, even the IOC’s European dominated membership would have been embarrassed to select one of their cities to stage the event for the 15th time – especially considering Sochi is hosting in 2010 – when Asia has held the event just twice.

The overall budget for the Games is estimated at £2.1 billion, contrasted against the £9bn being spent staging admittedly larger scale London 2012 Olympics, and includes several major transport infrastructure projects.

In 2017 a high speed rail line will link Seoul with Pyeongchang in just 50 minutes and new highway between the cities will reduce the driving time by 40 minutes to less than two hours.

Winter sports have boomed in South Korea in the past four years, the product of a growing leisure class in an increasingly prosperous Asian nation. 

In 1999, there were only 11 ski resorts in South Korea, now there are at least 17 while the country ranked fifth on the last Winter Olympic medal table – behind only winter sport powerhouses Canada, Germany, USA and Norway – with 14 medals, including six golds.

“Now Rio and us have shown other developing countries that with a good bid and a good campaign they can host games, too. It’s a great chance for developing countries to take hope to organise either the Winter Games or Summer Games in the future,” said Park Yong-sung, the head of the Korean Olympic Committee.

Cho Yang-ho, Pyeongchang 2018’s bid chairman, admitted surprise at the number of votes his campaign picked up in the first round of voting while Olympic figure skating champion Kim Yu-Na – already an early favourite to light the flame – hinted she would not quit the sport after Sochi but continue for another Games.

“I am lost for words about now,” she said.

“I can’t say anything right now. I’m really excited. It will be very good to compete in my own country.”

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Winter Olympics 2018Winter Sports

OLYMPIC figure skating champion Kim Yu-Na claims she is more nervous about Pyeongchang’s hopes of staging the 2018 Winter Olympics than she was in Vancouver.

STAR POWER: Kim Yu-Na was the star turn in Pyeongchang’s presentation to IOC members ahead of the 2018 Winter Olympic host city election in Durban

Yu-Na was the star turn of the last Games – producing a flawless performance that dazzled the judges, wowed the crowd and delighted viewers around the world.

Winning over the International Olympic Committee’s 95 voting members will not be as easy with the Korean frontrunner seeing the race tightening in the closing stages, thanks to a strong finish from rivals Munich. Outsiders Annecy are the third city in the running.

“I’ve trained harder for today than for most of my competitions,” she said.

“You can make history today, our people have waited for over ten years for this moment.

“When this dream began ten years ago I was a young girl. I choose a winter sport with good training facilities and coaches in Korea. But many of our athletes travel half way around the world to train for their Olympic dreams. Pyeongchang 2018 could change that forever.”

Pyeongchang unsuccessfully bid in 2010 and 2014 – losing out to Sochi by just four votes for the next Games and Vancouver, for last year’s event, by only three votes.

They have long been considered frontrunners – their message of a compact Games aided by their insistence it was time to take the Winter Games away from its traditional home of Europe – which has staged the event 14 times – to Asia, where the Winter Olympics have been held just twice, in 1998 and 1972.

Rio played the ‘it’s our turn’ card to perfection to win the race for 2016 summer Games and Pyeongchang have copied the tactic to perfection.

“If any region needs replenishment, we humbly propose we need the Winter Olympics in Asia, to tend the seeds that you sowed in Japan in 1972 and 1998,” said bid spokeswoman Theresa Rah. “But this race is not about geography, it is a race about dreams and human potential.

“Uniquely Pyeongchang 2018 offers you both a historic choice and a historic chance.”

Pyeongchang’s presentation was certainly slick – perhaps the best of the three candidates, a light touch in contrast to their more serious previous attempts that were packed with detail but lacked emotion.

Bid leader Yang Ho Cho wished rivals luck ‘but not too much of it’ while Korean Olympic chief Park Yong-sung singled out colleague Prince Albert of Monaco for his joke.

“I’m sorry you are spending your honeymoon listening to our bid for a third time,” he said.

“But the people of Korea and Pyeongchang have been dreaming of this for a long time. We want the Games.”

With seven absentees, 95 IOC members will be eligible to vote in the first round, meaning 48 votes would be enough to win when ballots are cast later today.

If no majority is reached, the city with the least support will be eliminated and the two remaining cities will go to a second and final ballot.

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Winter Olympics 2018Winter Sports

ANNECY have promised a return to a more intimate atmosphere at the Winter Olympics if they are successful in their 2018 bid – and they’ve played down suggestions their campaign has disappointing local support. 

PROMISE: Annecy’s 2018 bid team have promised full stadia, despite reports of flagging local support for their Winter Olympic bid

When France lasted staged the Winter Olympics, in Albertville in 1992, the Games were criticised for lacking any atmosphere, with events spread across a huge swathe of the Savoie region.

The next Games, staged in the tiny Norwegian town of Lillehammer, returned the Winter Olympics to a more intimate tradition but subsequent events have been held in bigger and bigger cities.

In Turin and Vancouver, hosts in 2006 and 2010, snow events were staged more than three hours travelling time away from other sports.

But Annecy, whose proposed initial venues were originally criticised by an International Olympic Committee inspection team, have promised a return to the roots of event – with venues no more than 45 minutes apart and athletes housed just a few minutes from their respective competitions.

“We will stage authentic games at the heart of the mountains, it will be a unique celebration,” said bid leader Charles Beigbeder, during a 45 minute presentation, peppered with well-crafted video support, to IOC members in Durban.

“We want a Games that are hosted by mountain communities, we won’t bring people from the cities to the mountains.

“It will intimate, friendly, accessible and warm. We will bring snow and ice back together.”

Annecy’s bid has been plagued by internal problems with original bid leader Edgar Grosprion stepping aside in a row over the campaign budget.

Local support in the Mont Blanc region is seen as a major weakness, with British IOC member Adam Pengilly questioning whether a successful bid would struggle to fill venues.

“Results of opinion polls are perhaps less good than we would have hoped them to be because they were taken when we had internal difficulties,” admitted French sports minister Chantal Jouanno.

“More recent opinion bolls are much better. 90 percent of the national population and between 60 and 70 percent of those locally support our bid.

“We won’t have any problem filling stadia, indeed we will have to enlarge them because we are a country that loves sport and loves winter sport.

“We had 260,000 spectators at the World skiing championships in Val d’Isere – a record for that event.”

Election frontrunners Pyeongchang will be the final candidate to make their presentation to the IOC’s membership, 95 of whom will be eligible to cast their votes later today.

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Winter Olympics 2018Winter Sports

Posted: Wednesday 6th July 2011 | 9:22

GERMAN president Christian Wuff has asked the International Olympic Committee to place their trust in Munich – and elect the city hosts of the 2018 Winter Olympics.

SUPPORTER: Thomas Bach, a likely candidate to be the next IOC president, spoke powerfully in favour of Munich’s 2018 Olympic bid

Wuff was the star political turn in a delegation that included senior IOC member Thomas Bach, bid chairman and two-time Olympic figure skating gold medallist Katarina Witt, bid chief executive Bernard Schwank, football legend Franz Beckenbauer and double Olympic champion skier Maria Riesch.

Their 45-minute presentation to IOC members was slick, if a little predictable, and will be followed by rivals Annecy and frontrunners Pyeongchang, with members voting on their city of choice later today.

“Place your trust in us for the Winter Games 2018,” said Wuff. “Germany is united behind Munich 2018. We recognise the huge achievements of sports organisation like the IOC and we are committed to the values of the Paralympic Games.

“Let our dreams come true.”

Munich are considered the closest challengers to Pyeongchang, who are making a third bid for the Games having lost out to Vancouver and Sochi in recent elections.

It would be the first city to stage both the summer and winter Games with many of the 1972 Olympic venues used for ice events and snow competitions held in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, which hosted the Olympics in 1936.

Witt guaranteed ‘full stadia’ while Munich mayor Christian Ude promised beer – something that usually guarantees victory in student elections – by simulating the tapping of a famous Oktoberfest keg.

“We have been longing to host the Winter Olympic Games for more than 80 years,” said Bach, considered one of the likely successors to current IOC president Jacques Rogge when he stands aside in 2013.

“Today is about the questions we will all face tomorrow. It is about the sport tomorrow and the society of tomorrow. This is a sport driven bid.

“Can Olympic Winter Games be organised in a sustainable way? Yes. The legacy of Munich 2018 will not be jeopardised by any White elephants.

“Is the election of the host really about sport and the athletes? Yes.”

Bach also subtly countered the argument of rivals Pyeongchang, who it is believed may finally be rewarded for their perseverance after two unsuccessful bids.

“If I were to speak from my heart I would tell you this is the fourth Olympic bid from Germany in recent years,” he added.

“But this decision today is about the merits and only the merits of the 2018 bids.”

Witt later declared herself ‘delighted’ with the response the presentation received – but admitted she was happy the pressure was finally off.

“I think the IOC’s attention was uninterrupted,” she said.

“It was a special day we had worked towards for two years and we are now first of all relieved it is over.”

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