Olympic champion Christine Ohuruogu was named athlete of the year by the British Olympic Association on Saturday, a year after she overturned the organization’s ban for a doping violation.
The 24-year-old Londoner beat favourite Sanya Richards at August’s Beijing Games to become Britain’s first ever female Olympic gold medallist over 400 metres.
Ohuruogu was banned for 12 months after missing three out-of-competition doping tests from October 2005 to July 2006, and had to win a court battle to overturn her lifetime BOA ban.
UK Athletics had said she was guilty of a technical offence and welcomed her onto the Beijing team, but Ohuruogu’s achievements have consistently been overshadowed.
She won the world championship in Osaka, Japan, in August 2007 barely weeks after returning to competition.
The families of British athletes competing at the London Olympics will be guaranteed tickets after a landmark agreement yesterday between Games organisers and the British Olympic Association (BOA).
Further discussions will be held in the next fortnight on the number to be provided from the national allocation in an effort to avoid forcing the parents and siblings of Olympic competitors on to the black market.
The agreement, struck on the eve of completion of the first official Games venue in Weymouth today, is a response to problems over ticket allocation in China. The squeeze on supply led the parents of Rebecca Adlington, the double Olympic swimming champion, to a rogue website where they were conned out of £1,100. Five people behind the widespread scam were arrested this week by serious fraud investigators.
The small velodrome meant that key members of the British cycling set-up could not get access; the parents of Chris Hoy, the triple gold medal-winner, watched their son perform only after receiving last-minute tickets from a sponsor. The demand in London is expected to be even greater.
“Our first priority is an allocation of tickets to the athletes,” Colin Moynihan, the BOA chairman, said. “The principle has been agreed. The athletes have given their lives to be members of Team GB and their family should be given the opportunity of enjoying the Games around them.” The ticketing issue was hotly discussed at a formal Beijing debrief in London this week. The organisers want to avoid an embarrassing repeat of empty seats in Beijing that occurred despite its billing as the first sold-out Games.
The Beijing Olympics were an “indisputable success” that brought change to China in areas as diverse as press freedom, the environment and public health, according to an assessment released by the International Olympic Committee that activists criticized as ignoring human rights violations that occurred during the Games.
The review, released by the Olympic committee during meetings in London this week, credited the Beijing Games with attracting broader participation and larger audiences than any other Olympics.
“The Games expanded and strengthened the Olympic movement by advancing the universality of sport,” the three-page fact sheet said. “They also brought many tangible and intangible benefits to China, especially in terms of public infrastructure improvements. While some of the positive benefits were immediately apparent, others will emerge with time.”
The International Olympic Committee is seeking to improve the ticketing system for upcoming Games in Vancouver and London to avoid the problem of empty seats that occurred in Beijing this year.
The IOC and London organizers, meanwhile, expressed confidence Thursday that the 2012 Olympics will be a success despite the global economic downturn. And London’s Olympic chief said the Games will be “secure” from terrorism.
Olympic officials concluded weeklong meetings aimed at passing on lessons learned from the Beijing Games, which the IOC described as “an indisputable success” that could lead to further social, economic and political progress in China.
The Beijing review was meant to transfer knowledge to upcoming host cities, particularly London for 2012. Organizers of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games and 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, also took part. So did officials from the four cities bidding for the 2016 Summer Games: Chicago, Madrid, Rio de Janeiro and Tokyo.
“The 2008 Games set new standards for organization, venues and athletic performances, but we can always improve,” IOC Olympic Games executive director Gilbert Felli said. “I’m confident that the London organizers will host a first class event with a uniquely British atmosphere.”
Ticketing and empty seats were singled out as key issues. While tickets were sold out in Beijing, there were still vacant seats at some of the venues, Felli said.
He said this may have been because ticket-holders did not stay at the venues for long or back-to-back sessions. Also, some tickets were allocated to groups across China which may not have shown up, he said.
Some tickets also ended up on the black market, while fake tickets were sold to unsuspecting fans in online scams.
The Beijing Olympics were an “indisputable success” that brought change to China in areas as diverse as press freedom, the environment and public health, according to an assessment released by the International Olympic Committee this week that activists criticized as ignoring human-rights violations that occurred during the Games.
The review, released by the Olympic committee during meetings in London this week, credited the Beijing Games with attracting broader participation and larger audiences than any other Olympics in history.
“The Games expanded and strengthened the Olympic Movement by advancing the universality of sport,” according to the three-page fact sheet. “They also brought many tangible and intangible benefits to China, especially in terms of public infrastructure improvements. While some of the positive benefits were immediately apparent, others will emerge with time.”
The document praised the Beijing organizers’ nearly flawless execution of the Games, detailing the successful coordination of half a million volunteers and maintenance of a complex transportation and security system. It noted that the media facilities were “widely praised as the best ever,” and that the Chinese government has indefinitely reduced restrictions on foreign media who report in the country.
But it made no mention of several highly publicized crackdowns on would-be protestors, or of Internet censorship at the media center and harassment of foreign journalists during the Games.
“I think the I.O.C.’s fact sheet is missing a lot of salient facts,” said Minky Worden, media director for Human Rights Watch. “What is missing in this document is the extent to which the International Olympic Committee lowered its standards on human rights around the Beijing Olympic Games.”
Thousands of people were evicted from their homes to make way for construction of Olympic venues, and some activists were detained before the Games began. Although authorities set up “protest zones” during the Olympics, no demonstrations took place, and several people who applied for protest permits were detained, including two elderly women who were initially sentenced to up to a year of “re-education through labor.” The sentence was later rescinded.
The two, who were speaking on behalf of the International Golf Federation, were embarking on what will be a year-long process in which golf will vie with six other sports – rugby 7s, squash, karate, roller sports, softball and baseball – for inclusion in the 2016 Games.
Dawson and Votaw came away from their presentation feeling upbeat. The Commission appeared impressed that golf’s amateur and professional bodies were speaking with one voice – and they seemed similarly taken with the news that the game boasts 60 million participants worldwide.
Again, a bit of name-dropping on Dawson’s and Votaw’s part did not go amiss. The Commission liked the sound of golf’s Olympic drive having the full support of such as Tiger Woods and Lorena Ochoa.
Golf’s charitable input would have been viewed as another plus. The R&A, for instance, dig deeply into their Open championship profits to send balls, clubs and other equipment to developing golfing lands. Votaw, on behalf of the PGA Tour, referred this morning to the many millions raised for charities via the American circuit. In 2007 it amounted to 123 million dollars, with that figure upped for ‘08.
In answer to whether the members of the IOC Programme Commission as a body had looked as if they leant more towards, say, golf or roller-sports, Dawson said a wry, “Golf, I hope.”
THE high command of the Olympic movement is to meet in London to discuss what lessons can be learned from the Beijing Games.
Up to 70 VIPs will attend the “Beijing debrief” this month in a week-long summit which will begin with a lecture by Jacques Rogge, president of the International Olympic Committee.
Mr Rogge is expected to tackle the issue of how the scale of the Olympic Games can be adapted to cope with a worldwide recession. Last month he sparked a row when he said that to avoid the main 2012 stadium becoming a “white elephant” after the Games, the athletics track could be removed. Officials from the Beijing Games organising committee, Bocog, will brief their London counterparts on issues ranging from transport, catering and security. Bocog earned praise for the organisation of the Games and the sports venues, especially the Bird’s Nest and the Water Cube.
However, the London organising committee, Locog, will be keen to improve on public catering at venues and the poor atmosphere in the Beijing Olympic Green.
Meetings will be led by Hein Verbruggen, head of the IOC’s team overseeing the Beijing Games, and IOC chief technocrat Gilbert Felli.
Future Winter Olympics hosts Vancouver and Sochi will also attend, as will cities bidding to host the 2016 Games - Rio, Madrid, Chicago and Tokyo - who will also be given a tour of the Olympic Park. They will be discreetly trying to lobby the dozen IOC members in attendance, ahead of the 2016 vote next year in Copenhagen.
?BORIS Johnson has rejected claims that Olympic chiefs will struggle to put on the 2012 Games because of the financial downturn.
“Not only can we cope, but we can do a fantastic job,” he insisted, adding that this would be done within the £9.3 billion budget.
However, the Mayor admitted that Games organisers may have to attract more foreign investment, particularly from China, as a result.
The Standard reported last month that he was holding talks with some of China’s leading universities to establish a new campus in the Olympic Park.
Mr Johnson’s remarks on Channel 4 News come after Olympics minister Tessa Jowell said the Government would not have bid for the Games if it had known a recession was on its way.
source: thisislondon.co.uk
The IOC are growing increasingly frustrated at Britain’s refusal to introduce legislation to outlaw the possession, supply and distribution of performance-enhancing drugs.
Their stance leaves them out of step with other European countries such as Sweden, France, Italy, Greece and Germany where anti-doping laws mean athletes and their suppliers can go to jail.
Arne Ljungqvist, the chairman of the IOC’s medical commission, said he would be pressing for a change in the British law, which would be an important legacy of the 2012 Olympics.
The subject will be raised by the IOC when Olympic host and bidding cities gather in London later this month for a post-Beijing debrief.
The IOC are considering making it a condition of bidding for future Olympic Games that candidate countries have anti-doping laws. In the meantime, just as the Chinese authorities were persuaded to introduce new legislation in the run-up to this summer’s Games, Britain will be under pressure to fall into line.
Ljungqvist, who is also a board member of the World Anti-Doping Agency, said: “I think legislation is very important that criminalises certain offences as detailed in the WADA code because it allows public authorities to intervene where we cannot.
“We as sports authorities have our limited possibilities regulated by our code. We can do testing but we cannot do searches.”
Stocks markets and oil prices may dip and dive, but Olympic organizers with preparations under way for three games in the next six years aren’t breaking a sweat.
The reasons? Time and television money. The global economic downturn has squeezed private financing for venues that will be a part of London’s 2012 Summer Games and Sochi’s 2014 winter edition, but with brisk ticket sales for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics and most of the sponsors locked in, the IOC can afford to hold off making new deals for television rights and sponsorships.
“All of us feel this,” said Gerhard Heiberg, head of the International Olympic Committee’s marketing commission. “Of course, this has an impact for everyone in the world. It never comes at a convenient time. But we don’t feel we are affected too much in general. Things are moving everywhere in the right direction. Some things may take longer than originally hoped.”
The financial pinch comes as IOC president Jacques Rogge seeks another term that will keep him in office until 2013. He says the committee is closely monitoring the financial situation.
“It would be naive and shortsighted to say that nothing will happen,” Rogge said last week, confirming his plans to seek re-election next October, when he is expected to be unopposed. “Yes, the situation is so volatile that it is too soon to draw conclusions.”
Rogge said the Olympic movement is in “excellent financial health.” Total Olympic TV and sponsorship revenues for the 2005-08 cycle - covering the 2006 Turin Winter Games and 2008 Beijing Olympics - totalled about US$3.5 billion.
CHICAGO may be riding a wave of Obama-mania, but can the American city receive a “yes you can” from the International Olympic Committee to host the 2016 summer Olympic Games?
Bookmakers certainly believe so.
The lengthy process of awarding hosting rights to the Games is well and truly under way as the competing field has been narrowed to a shortlist of four: Chicago, Rio de Janeiro, Tokyo and Madrid.
A final decision is to be made on October 9 next year.
Japan’s capital has hosted the Games already — in 1964 — while a Chicago Games would take the Olympics back to the US for the first time since Atlanta in 1996. Chicago has previously bid for the Olympics three times (including losing out to Melbourne for the 1956 Games).
Rio, if successful, would be the first South American city to host the Games.
Previous Brazilian bids have failed due to concerns about lack of modern facilities and security fears. But the country will hope to springboard from the legacy left by hosting the soccer World Cup in 2014.
Madrid lost out to London for the 2012 Games but is bidding again, pushing its sporting culture and stadiums, status as one of the few major European capitals to have never hosted the Games and support from former IOC head Juan Antonio Samaranch.
City of Vancouver officials played down suggestions Thursday that its $1-billion Olympic athletes’ village being built in the southeast False Creek area may be at risk. But they would not reveal what went on in a closed council meeting about the project in October.
They refused to confirm reports that the city has agreed to loan Millennium Development Corp. or its financial backer, Fortress Investment Group, up to $100 million in addition to the $190 million the city had already offered as a loan guarantee to make sure the 1,100-unit project is built in time for the 2010 Winter Games.
The new deal, apparently approved in a tightly scripted in camera meeting Oct. 14, was confirmed by Sun columnist Miro Cernetig after it was first reported by a national newspaper, which also claimed the city’s longtime finance director, Estelle Lo, had resigned over concerns about the city’s financial exposure on the project.
Mayor Sam Sullivan, Coun. Peter Ladner and other elected politicians who attended the in-camera meeting all refused to discuss it, citing confidentiality rules. However, both the mayor and Ladner, who is running under the Non-Partisan Association banner to replace Sullivan, said Lo continued to work for the city and that she had never expressed to them or to council as a whole, any concern over financing for the village project.
“She has not quit and continues to work for the city,” Sullivan said. He said he would have been told by city manager Judy Rogers if Lo had resigned, and instead had been assured that “she is still on the city’s payroll.”
With only two days left in the Phase 1 Request
Period of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games ticketing program, the
Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter
Games (VANOC) is advising Canadians not to wait until the last moment before
requesting tickets. This is the public’s best chance to request tickets; the
deadline is midnight, on Friday, November 7, 2008 (Pacific Time).
“Interest and new accounts have been increasing every day, and clearly
Canadians are enthusiastic about attending the Games. Our data shows that they
are taking some time to complete their requests and are building their ticket
requests over several days as they consider their options with friends and
family,” said Caley Denton, vice-president, ticketing and consumer marketing.
“So with only two days remaining, our message is simple: this is your best
chance to get Olympic tickets, so give yourself enough time and don’t wait
until the last minute.”
As sports fans across the nation ponder the implications of having a dedicated pick-up basketball player and known sports fanatic as our Commander-in-Chief, it’s worth noting today that Obama’s geographical and not athletic affiliation may prove to have the greatest impact on the future of sports in America.
Obama already has been active in Chicago’s bid for the 2016 Olympics, and given his newfound stature in the world right now, it’s not hard to imagine that his full-fledged support as President would bring the Summer Games to the Windy City for the first time in history.
Japanese officials behind Tokyo’s bid to host the 2016 Games are all but conceding today, admitting that one of Obama’s trademark speeches as part of a Chicago presentation to the IOC would be tough to beat.
The other two cities that are finalists for the 2016 Olympics are Rio de Janeiro and Madrid. When the four finalists were announced this summer, a widening rift between the IOC and the U.S. Olympic Committee over television revenues was reported to be a serious threat to Chicago’s chances, with the American city viewed as the longshot of the four finalists to secure the eventual bid.
ATHENS, Nov 5 (Reuters) - Barack Obama’s victory in the U.S. presidential election has given Chicago, bidding to host the 2016 Olympics, the chance to shine on the international stage, its bid leader said on Wednesday.
“I think the eyes of the world have been on Barack Obama and therefore on Chicago and the eyes of the world will be on Chicago more than in the past,” Chicago 2016 bid chief Patrick Ryan told Reuters.
Democrat candidate Obama, who has spent most of his political life in Chicago, enjoyed a sweeping victory in the U.S. presidential election on Tuesday.
Chicago is one of four candidates vying for the 2016 Summer Olympics alongside Tokyo, Rio de Janeiro and Madrid.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will choose the winner at its session in Copenhagen in October next year.
“Last night gave us a global opportunity to show the city’s beautiful skyline, its lake and parks,” Ryan said of Obama’s speech in front of more than 200,000 cheering supporters in Chicago’s Grant Park.
If people are cutting spending on luxury items in these uncertain economic times, they’re not doing it on tickets to the Olympic Games.
With just over a week to go in the first phase of ticket sales, packages to the 2010 Olympics are selling out and individual requests are increasing daily.
Around 120 packages that contained tickets to the gold-medal men’s hockey game were gone two weeks after they went on sale, said Jean-Paul Modde, the president of CoSport, the official hospitality provider for the Vancouver Olympics.
Packages that include tickets to the opening ceremonies are also selling quickly.
Modde said sales have been brisker than expected, in spite of the economic uncertainty facing the world.
“This is not something that somebody wakes up on Friday morning and says, ‘oh you know what, let’s buy an Olympic package today,”‘ said Modde.
“People have been planning this for a long time and they know that things are going to turn around.”
The packages include other event tickets, accommodation and in some cases, transportation and meals.
They range in price from $3,800 to $34,500.
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