2030 Olympic Winter Games Bids

[AustralianFan]

32 minutes ago, neige said:

and the winner is....

Congratulations France 2030!  Better late than never and you showed how quickly a cohesive, supported, unified bid with key government and business support can win the day any day.

 

[AustralianFan]

3 hours ago, Sigh said:

I’m surprised!

Not by the selections for 2030 and 2034 that turned out as I had expected.

The reasons the SOK bid was not accepted was also eminently predictable.

What surprised me was the “de facto” appointment of Switzerland for the 2038 games and thus the consequent utter humiliation of the SOK who once again had failed to do its job properly. Either getting the guarantees or abandon the whole thing when realizing it was impossible. Of course, that would require them to exit their little rose-tainted bubble. Their basic problem is that while SOK wants the games, SWEDEN doesn’t.

 

 

I think this is where I bow out.

When I came here in March I reacted to the sometimes rather breathless and naïve enthusiasm. Add to that that I have a(n un)healthy dose of cynicism and a fondness for playing Devil’s advocate …

I’m sure that I have annoyed (or even worse) many of you. I apologize for that, sort of.

As things turned out, I did convince one person – me.

The more I dug into things related to WOGs, the more I became convinced that at least the winter games were a once great idea that now has passed its “use by date”. I’ll not go into details of why. You don’t want to hear them and anyway, you already know them. The fact that the IOC EB just vindicated my cynicism only confirms my conviction.

 

 

However, I can’t resist to part on a controversial (and cynical) note:

The 2038 WOGs will be held in Asia, probably China, despite what was said today.

The 2042 WOGs will be held in Russia (that will have come in from the cold by then).

Then we start over with France again, followed by USA, China and Russia. As you might recognize, that’s four out of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council. Once the mayor of Sapporo retires, I don’t expect any other country will have the combination of facilities, capabilities (in all necessary areas, including security) and WILL.

The only exception could be if the 2038 WOGs are awarded to “we were going to promote winter sports anyway” India as a consolation in the highly unlikely case Ahmadabad isn’t appointed for 2036.

Farewell – and have fun

Sigh

@Sigh I do hope you stay.  Your balanced and considered insights and intel and opinions are very much respected and admired around here.  I join with others in expressing my appreciation for the intelligence and gravitas you bring and consistently deliver.

[krow]

14 minutes ago, AustralianFan said:

@Sigh I do hope you stay.  Your balanced and considered insights and intel and opinions are very much respected and admired around here.  I join with others in expressing my appreciation for the intelligence and gravitas you bring and consistently deliver.

i vote to keep sigh and get rid of you, though i suppose we wouldn't even have a forum if not for your insipid thread bumping so i guess i'll just continue reading this board out of the corners of my rolled eyes. 

[AustralianFan]

22 minutes ago, krow said:

i vote to keep sigh and get rid of you 

You had one chance to be nice.  Today.

Back on the ignore list for you @krow

[AustralianFan]

A Gamesbids poll re today’s outcomes:

 

[krow]

23 minutes ago, AustralianFan said:

You had one chance to be nice.  Today.

Back on the ignore list for you @krow

this IS me being nice ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Bear]

2 hours ago, neige said:

and the winner is....

you can have all of the venues in the world but when the public and government support isn't there, what use do they have?

[Karenina]

One thing I noted from the IOC press conference today was that apparently the vast majority of French corporate sponsors signed on for Paris 2024 have also indicated they'reon board with Nice-Alpes 2030.  I'm sure that was a significant factor in today's decision, along with the government guaranty.

Switzerland basically needs a public referendum in support of 2038 plus a slight re-working of the venue plan and them they'll be all set, and they've got 4 years to get it done.

[AustralianFan]

7 minutes ago, Karenina said:

One thing I noted from the IOC press conference today was that apparently the vast majority of French corporate sponsors signed on for Paris 2024 have also indicated they'reon board with Nice-Alpes 2030.  I'm sure that was a significant factor in today's decision, along with the government guaranty.

Switzerland basically needs a public referendum in support of 2038 plus a slight re-working of the venue plan and them they'll be all set, and they've got 4 years to get it done.

Yes 4 years is a long time and I’m sure they’ll get it done and formally be elevated to TD and elected as 2038 host in 2027.

Public support for a Winter Ganes in Switzerland sitting in a pretty nice spot at the moment (October).

Then they’ll still have 11 years from 2027 before the 2038 Games to make the anended plans happen.

[Sir Rols]

In the absence of ITG (which just ran a short piece lifted from Agence France Presse), there’s The Inquisitor’s take on the announcement

The IOC and Olympic decisions: ruleless, beyond control

[Sigh]

It's official: I'm not a man of his word.

 

I'm surprised that's it's only Robert that has realized that the EB effectively killed off the Swiss Olympic bid last Tuesday.

Swiss Olympic's bid was a masterpiece in structuring something the Swiss people could accept.

1. Distributed venues: Would give the "whole" country a feeling of being a part of the games. This without potentially burdening any one town with too much needed infrastructure/accomodation. Further they avoided having any "single point of failure". If one town declined to participate, finding venues for one to three events elsewhere, and not necessarily together, would be manageable. Finding an entire new hub is much more difficult.

2. Financial Guarantees. The bid was structured expressedly to avoid asking for any government financial guarantee. Such a demand would more or less automatically trigger a referendum. Something Swiss Olympic was desperate to avoid.

3. Referendum. Referendums are bid killers, espcially in Switzerland. Even if opinion is favorable before the campaign all the negative aspects will be highlighed. In this case the whole Italian mess will be brought into light since it's going to be fresh in people's memory anyway. Now the EB requires that the bid will exposed to a referendum when the way Swiss Olympic had structured its bid could possibly have circumvented the need for one.

 

So, I suggest that you start thinking about who's going to get the games in 2038. My money is on Beijing. Only for the purest of cynical reasons of course. A safe bet considering who's going to make the decision.

 

 

 

As for the SOK bid. To be fair it wasn't Sweden that failed to get its act together. It was SOK.

Sweden as such was never keen on the games. Neither was it really against. The dominant view was an overwhelming indifference. However, the 70% appears to correct as a figure. Only it's 70% out of some 35000 votes on the online question (on the sports pages on the biggest newspaper in Sweden) "Are you disappointed that Swden didn't get the games?" who say NO. Media in Swedish mostly just noted the decision and then went silent on the subject.

If there's a gold medal to be handed out it's to SOK for their magnificent disregard of trying to enthuse Swedish opinion.

SOK had even failed to hand in the formal application for government guarantees. The press secretary of the sports ministry said that had they done that last Tuesday the process would have been ready in April.

 

And finally, as many have noted, it's rather stupid not to hava a back-up until the French pen is on the dotted line.

 

[FYI]

21 minutes ago, Sigh said:

It's official: I'm not a man of his word. 

[Bear]

On 6/23/2023 at 2:39 PM, Bear said:

Well if 2024 goes to plan, I can probably see France bidding in the future.

why are so many people suddenly going back in time to like this old comment

[FYI]

4 minutes ago, Bear said:

why are so many people suddenly going back in time to like this old comment

Because it must be a certain you-know-who that has multiple accounts to lick, I mean 'like' their own posts, & others who they seem to agree with. Especially if it means propping up any new-norm rhetoric that they're thrashing about around here.