The Olympics This Week - October 6, 2008
With under 500 days until Vancouver 2010 and the London 2012 countdown moving past the 1400-day point, here's what's going on in the world of the Games this week.
LONDON 2012: Since the Closing Ceremony in Beijing, there have been major seismic shifts in the world financial markets, with credit dissolving and fortunes lost around the globe. These dynamics also affect the world of the Olympics, and the staging of future Games. The organizers of the next summer event four years from now are considering scaling back a bit, and with banking collapses as background, London's Olympic Board will meet this Thursday to discuss matters including privatization of some construction projects. The BBC's Mihir Bose explains:
We're one year away from London's first large-scale Olympic test event, the Gymnastics World Championships at the 02 Arena (formerly known as "The Dome") on the east side of the city.
VANCOUVER 2010: The next Olympic winter event are a mere 16 months away, so best to make plans now if you're attending. Last Friday, the ticket application system for the 2010 Winter Olympic Games opened, which will accept requests until Nov. 7. Here's the link.
The Vancouver festival will be the first for a new regime at the United States Olympic Committee, which elected a new chairman this past week. Larry Probst was one of the executives from the early days of video game company Electronic Arts, and helped grow the company into a $3 billion empire. Probst replaces former Coca-Cola executive Peter Ueberroth, best known for his successful organization of the Los Angeles 1984 Games which ushered in the age of Gigantic Olympics. The USOC brought him on in 2004 to help reorganize and streamline the national Olympic governing body.
And in sport-related news...
GYMNASTICS: One of the ongoing Beijing sagas in August was speculation that the Chinese women's gymnastic team, winners of the overall gold medal, was not made up of women at all. A decade-old rule prohibits gymnasts under 16 (achieved at any point during an Olympic year) to compete, and accusations flew about forged documents for several members, including He Kexin, who won the uneven bars in a tiebreaker decision over American all-around champion Nastia Liukin. Documents found on the internet suggested she was 14, but the Federation of International Gymnastics concluded that the documents presented by China were accurate after a six-week investigation.
EQUESTRIAN: The fallout from the second consecutive Olympics with horse-doping scandals continues. Late last week, the International Equestrian Federation (FEI) stripped Brazilian Rodrigo Pessoa of the fifth-place finish of he and his horse Rufus from the 2008 jumping competition. The sad irony is that Pessoa finished in silver position in 2004, but was elevated to gold when Ireland's Cian O'Connor was found to have applied drugs to his mount. There were six drug cases after this year's Olympics, up from two four years ago.
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With under 500 days until Vancouver 2010 and the London 2012 countdown moving past the 1400-day point, here's what's going on in the world of the Games this week.LONDON 2012: Since the Closing Ceremony in Beijing, there have been major seismic shifts in the world financial markets, with credit dissolving and fortunes lost around the globe. These dynamics also affect the world of the Olympics, and the staging of future Games. The organizers of the next summer event four years from now are considering scaling back a bit, and with banking collapses as background, London's Olympic Board will meet this Thursday to discuss matters including privatization of some construction projects. The BBC's Mihir Bose explains:
Back in July, just before the Beijing Olympics and despite the gathering economic clouds, I was confidently told that the funding for the Village would be in place by August. Now it is clear that such plans are not ready and the developers will only be granted bank loans if they are underwritten by the government, making it the lender of last resort. It is worth knowing that the government has already pledged extra funding of its own, committing an additional £250m for the building of the Village.For his part, IOC president Jacques Rogge doesn't believe that the current financial crisis will have a devastating effect on future Olympic planning. "No one has certainties today, but I am not pessimistic for the Olympic Games," he said last week.
We're one year away from London's first large-scale Olympic test event, the Gymnastics World Championships at the 02 Arena (formerly known as "The Dome") on the east side of the city.
VANCOUVER 2010: The next Olympic winter event are a mere 16 months away, so best to make plans now if you're attending. Last Friday, the ticket application system for the 2010 Winter Olympic Games opened, which will accept requests until Nov. 7. Here's the link.
The Vancouver festival will be the first for a new regime at the United States Olympic Committee, which elected a new chairman this past week. Larry Probst was one of the executives from the early days of video game company Electronic Arts, and helped grow the company into a $3 billion empire. Probst replaces former Coca-Cola executive Peter Ueberroth, best known for his successful organization of the Los Angeles 1984 Games which ushered in the age of Gigantic Olympics. The USOC brought him on in 2004 to help reorganize and streamline the national Olympic governing body.
And in sport-related news...
GYMNASTICS: One of the ongoing Beijing sagas in August was speculation that the Chinese women's gymnastic team, winners of the overall gold medal, was not made up of women at all. A decade-old rule prohibits gymnasts under 16 (achieved at any point during an Olympic year) to compete, and accusations flew about forged documents for several members, including He Kexin, who won the uneven bars in a tiebreaker decision over American all-around champion Nastia Liukin. Documents found on the internet suggested she was 14, but the Federation of International Gymnastics concluded that the documents presented by China were accurate after a six-week investigation.
"The FIG has shared its conclusions with the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which originally requested the inquiry. It is considered that the case is now concluded," FIG said in the statement. "Originals of official documents received from the Chinese Gymnastics Association, specifically passports, identity cards and family booklets or 'Household Registers', confirm the ages of the athletes."But the story's not over. After a check of the 2008 accreditation list, the focus switches to the 2000 Chinese team, which finished with bronze in Sydney behind Romania and Russia. Two of the gymnasts from that team, Dong Fangxiao and Yang Yun, may not have been old enough to compete at the Olympics, according to the FIG.
Dong's official birthdate is listed as Jan. 20, 1983. But her accreditation information for the Beijing Olympics, where she worked as a national technical official, lists her birthdate as Jan. 23, 1986, said Andre Gueisbuhler, the FIG's secretary general. "If that document is the correct one, that would suggest she was 14 years old at the Sydney Olympic Games," Gueisbuhler said.ATHLETICS: Over the weekend in Monte Carlo, the IAAF officially ratified the three sprint world records of Jamaica's Usain Bolt set in Beijing's Bird's Nest: 9.69 in the 100m, 19.30 in the 200m, and the 37.10 4x100m relay in which Bolt handed off to countryman and former World's Fastest Man Asafa Powell.
EQUESTRIAN: The fallout from the second consecutive Olympics with horse-doping scandals continues. Late last week, the International Equestrian Federation (FEI) stripped Brazilian Rodrigo Pessoa of the fifth-place finish of he and his horse Rufus from the 2008 jumping competition. The sad irony is that Pessoa finished in silver position in 2004, but was elevated to gold when Ireland's Cian O'Connor was found to have applied drugs to his mount. There were six drug cases after this year's Olympics, up from two four years ago.
Photo © Icon SMI
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