Olympic news knows no respite. So much the better. As the three candidate cities for the 2020 Summer Games enter the final three months of the campaign, things are also getting busy on the winter front. In their sights, the 2022 Games, an event whose organization the IOC must award in August 2015.
On Wednesday June 5, the City Council of Oslo, capital of Norway, voted in favor of a bid for the 2022 Winter Games. A first step which calls for others. A referendum must ask the residents of Oslo about their support for the project, on September 9, the day of the legislative elections in Norway. According to the latest opinion polls, “yes” would be clearly in the lead.
In the event of victory, the city of Oslo will request state assistance for the budgetary part of its application file. The rest is up to the Norwegians. Oslo prides itself on being the world capital best equipped with winter sports infrastructure.
Another project, less advanced but apparently just as solid, is carried out by Stockholm, the capital of Sweden. The president of the Swedish Olympic Committee, Stefan Lindeberg, is currently pushing with all his might to force the government's decision. He told news agency TT that the city “already has the majority of what is needed. » A slightly enigmatic formula, but affirmative enough to allow us to imagine a more official candidacy in the coming months.
On the other hand, nothing will come from the Canadian side. Marcel Aubut, the powerful and dynamic president of the Canadian Olympic Committee, spared no effort to convince Quebec to join the battle. And this, despite the recent organization of the Winter Games in Vancouver, in 2010. But the lawyer and businessman seems to have lost the battle. The press officer for Quebec City, Paul-Christian Nolin, was categorical, assuring that the Olympic Games would not be held in the region. With this strong argument: the absence of a mountain likely to host the men's downhill event in alpine skiing. “We continue to say that a mountain, even if you water it, it doesn’t grow,” quips Paul-Christian Nolin.
No Winter Games in Quebec, therefore, but the Canadian city is not giving up its sporting ambitions. According to her spokesperson, she would like to regularly organize international events. Like, for example, the synchronized swimming World Cup in 2014.
After the withdrawal of Saint-Moritz (Switzerland), the cities of Barcelona, Munich and Krakow make up, with Oslo, the list of potential candidates for the 2022 Winter Games.
