Pyeongchang has its say in front of International Olympic Committee
The city of Pyeongchang recently made its final bid in front of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in hopes of being selected as the host of the 2018 Winter Olympics. The presentations were held in Lome, Africa but the verdict will be decided in South
Africa on 7th July.
In the event that Pyeongchang gets the opportunity to host the international sporting event, it will be the first time that the country will be hosting the Olympic Winter Games. This is not the first time that Pyeongchang has delivered a bid for the Games;
it has already done so twice previously but failed to grab the opportunity in both cases.
The first of the bids was for the 2010 Games in which Pyeongchang lost to Vancouver, Canada, whereas the second time the city was bested by the Russian city of Sochi, which will now hold the 2014 Olympic Games.
Kim Yu-na, who is the honourary ambassador from Pyeongchang in the bidding process, made the following statements about the city’s prospects for winning the bid: “The strong point of the Pyeongchang (Olympics) is that it focuses on athletes (for their best
performance)… I want to show how I nurtured my dreams of competing at the Winter Olympics and how a Winter Games in Pyeongchang can influence young athletes. I will also emphasize that Asia hasn’t hosted the Winter Olympics for a long time and Pyeongchang
is ready to stage a good Olympics for athletes.”
The bid that Pyeongchang has made centers on the fact that the city will be able to provide the athletes with a friendly environment. They would be facilitated by the nearness of the venues which are not more than 30 minutes away from each other. Apart from
that, the Korean city aims to bring the Winter Olympics back to Asia as it is has come to the continent only twice, with both of the events taking place in Japan.
The other two cities in the running along with Pyeongchang are Annecy from France and Munich from Germany. With all three cities having made their final case, they can now only wait and see how the future unfolds.
Tags: