London 2012 – Are We at Risk of Repeating Montreal in 1976?



As a very keen supporter of the Olympic movement, nothing made me more proud that the moment that we successfully won the bid on the 6th of July 2005. Seeing the Parisians look mournfully at their champagne as it all went off in Trafalgar square was in a horrible way, fantastic. We had beaten the French who were so sure that they had it in the bag, and London was full of enthusiasm to bring sport’s greatest event to the London stage.



Fast forward 6 years with overspend increasing every day, a stadium that is the subject of a bitter battle between two London premier league teams, an aquatic centre that can’t be a leisure centre post-games because the roof is too low and a general discontent from many in East London regarding the handling of events and facilities. London appears to have lost its enthusiasm for 2012, which is such a shame considering how much we wanted it. At the moment it feels like the only sliver of redemption for the Olympic committee is the Velodrome, which has received widespread praise from the cycling community as it nears its completion date. It’s hard to believe that the venue that looks like a giant pringle crisp is the one holding up our hopes at the moment.



The London 2012 Velodrome

As we wait today for the OPLC decision on whether it will be West Ham or Tottenham Hotspur who will be the preferred bidder for ownership of the stadium once the games have ended, you have to ask as to whether all the public sniping has only further worsened the prospects of the games in the eyes of many Londoners.



The 'Big Owe'

In 1976 the Montreal Olympics changed the face of Olympic organisation and funding. Due to construction and venues being unfinished only a year before the games the final push to get things ready the debt when everything was over totalled around $1 billion, and the city was still paying off that debt 30 years later. The stadium which generated most of the cost was known as the ‘Big O’ due to its shape, but thanks to it being mostly unused since the games and its massive debts, residents of the city have renamed it the ‘Big Owe’.

Of course the stadium is over budget, you would be naive to think that any Olympic Stadium wouldn't be. Granted we are not in the position of the organisers in Delhi for the commonwealth games who were struggling to finish the running track as the athletes arrived in their accomodation, but we need to address issues like the funding for the 'wrap' around the stadium which was scrapped from the public funding in order to save money.

Montreal has suffered from its Olympic legacy, which is something we don’t want to happen here in London. The 1984 games in Los Angeles changed the face of Olympic funding as it looked to corporate support and sponsorship to put on one of the most ostentatious events in Olympic history, but a city needs both corporate and grassroots backing to make sure the legacy is in tact many years after the gold medallists have left.
 

West Ham's Impression for the Olympic Stadium





The Olympic organisers are already alienating the local public, by deciding not to run the marathon through east London and through London’s more significant sights gives a clear signal that East London is only really important because it had the space to accommodate the Olympic park and its various other needs, not because it’s an area that is worthy to see the world’s best battle it out on the roads around the park. Indeed, if the bid for the stadium goes to Tottenham Hotspur then it will be a second snub to East London, due to the West Ham bid being planned in conjunction with and financed by Newham council, who are looking to retain a legacy for their borough.

I personally believe that the bid should go West Ham’s way. As a West Ham supporter (ok, QPR are first in my affections, but the Hammers are a close second) it does worry me that we don’t really have the financial capacity to support the bid, and we are battling anyway to stay in the premier league, but the fact is that knocking down the Olympic stadium would be a travesty. Montreal’s stadium may have been an absolute disaster, but the demolition crew didn’t move in despite its troubles.

Although Spurs do propose to retain the legacy for athletics elsewhere in London rejuvenating Crystal Palace’s neglected athletics arena, the honest truth is that the Crystal Palace complex needs an entire makeover. What used to be at the forefront of sports development here in London is now a rather sad looking complex that would need a complete overhaul to compete with the facilities that are available elsewhere around the world.

We cannot expect greatness from our athletes if we are not prepared to provide for them at grassroots and give them access and support to facilities and staff. We now have excellent results in cycling, rowing and swimming with the gymnasts also pushing for glory once 2012 comes around, but can we really expect young athletes to keep going in distinctly average facilities once the lure of a home crowd has gone? Manchester Velodrome is looking a bit worse for wear and all credit to our swimmers who have fewer 50m swimming pools in the entire country than the city of Melbourne is Australia.

It would be a shame to see a world class athletics facility be ripped out all in the name of good seats to a football game. It can be viable to host athletics and football in the same place and it seems like Spurs, although producing an excellent bid, have forgotten the point of the Olympics. It’s about opening sport up to all and the excellence of the amateur. What better way to exclude the amateur athlete by ignoring its original purpose and making it a premier league football club.

The Quest for Slopestyle in 2014

For many the word Olympic conjures up scenes of running tracks, athletes who hone their craft based on 4 year cycles and of course people competing in little more than a swimming costume. But that’s the Summer Olympics, and I love them, but to be honest I much prefer their colder, cooler brother, the Winter Olympics.

The Winter Olympics although an institution haven’t been around all too long, the first games were held in 1924 and the events bore no resemblance to what you might have seen on TV last spring. There was no concept of aerodynamics let alone a twin tip. In fact Snowboarding was yet to be invented, forget being an actual Olympic sport so needless to say it was pretty different to our whole modern concept of winter sports.

As an ex-ski racer (please dear god don’t tell ANYONE) I love the Olympics. When I was younger it was all about the pretty dresses and ladies whirling across the ice in the figure skating. I genuinely thought that Torvil and Dean were the happily ever after story of the sporting world, and I’m still waiting for my Christopher Dean to come sweep me off my feet. Then I started skiing seriously and I could watch the racing for hours, obsessed by the technical brilliance of the world’s best skiers competing for what surely is the highest accolade in ski racing, Alain Baxter briefly thrilled us all with his bronze, but like everything in British Ski racing, our high hopes were dashed (but more on that in another post).

Now I’m all about the cool kids in their baggy pants on boards and on skis generally defying gravity and logic. Freestyle and the Olympics, let’s face it they don’t go together. The Olympics by definition requires strict technical parameters and generally shirks creativity (Gymnastics scoring anyone?) but I think it’s missing out if it doesn’t seriously consider slopestyle as a new event.

The X Games has proven that slopestyle can work in a high octane event. Granted the X Games doesn’t have the same bureaucratic streak that runs deep in the IOC, but it’s a worthy model to look at. The IOC’s excuse for never considering slopestyle (and halfpipe until very recently) was that it didn’t have an structured competition schedule in the season, but now with the incredibly successful Dew Tour, TTR Tour and the X Games which now has a European leg, that excuse appears to be defunct.

Of course as a British girl there is a big reason that I’d like to see Slopestyle in Sochi and her name is Jenny Jones. 3 time X Games Slopestyle gold medallist and Britain’s finest chance at snow sports glory. She’s not only an amazing boarder, but having interviewed her, also a hell of a nice girl and someone who has really worked her way up. Unlike our upcoming generation of indoor snow slope wunderkinds, Jenny started a little later in life, did a season in Tignes, and now she’s winning gold medals in Tignes.

Jenny's Winning Run in Aspen:

Most importantly, the inclusion of girls in the pipe and slopestyle for men and women opens up the Olympics to a whole host of people who might not watch because they see it as part of the ‘establishment’. Yes, the Olympics might suddenly mean that we’re a bit more mainstream, but think of how much it would bring in terms of wider sponsorship and funding into the sport. If your audience grows, so does your capacity to achieve more and make competitions bigger and better.

At the end of the day, it’s a chance for the Winter Olympics to embrace some of the younger crowd who have no interest in racing or full body spandex. Skiing is cool, but it would appear that racing has lost its appeal to many kids out there who now look up to Bobby Brown as their idol instead of Bode Miller. 

Jon Olsson @ London Freeze

If it’s going to work the IOC need to compromise, get some people on board who have experience in the event, and be willing to work together to get the best of both worlds. If it starts to sound like work, the chances are many athletes won’t be interested because the foundations of these events lie in having fun and pushing yourself to get that grab because you enjoy it, not because you cynically believe that the judge will give you more points.

Case and point is the incredibly versatile and talented Jon Olsson. While I stood on the jump, there wasn’t one time that as he flew off the kicker in the air towards the landing that the man didn’t have a smile on his face. No matter how hard the trick he looked liked he was genuinely enjoying it, and that my friends is the attitude we want to preserve.
 

The IOC in October said that the level of competitors in slopestyle is not up to the required standard, and to that I have to say; well why don't you go and give it a go and see for yourself, you might be surprised.

I could go on about this subject for hours and look at all the angles and every option and direction to take, but i'm going to wrap it up and put my soap box away, as this is meant to be a lighthearted blog afterall! Hopefully in 2014 i'll be linking back to this post as I write about the slopestyle medals won in Russia in 2014, you never know!