The Future Host Commission prepares its visits – Sport & Society

While the institutional and financial guarantees surrounding the applications of the French Alps for 2030 and Salt Lake City (Utah, United States) for 2034 must be submitted before the end of March, the Future Host Commission is preparing to inspect the sites proposed by the two projects.

View of Olympic House, IOC headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland (Credits – IOC / Greg Martin)

The evaluation of the two projects respectively selected for the 2030 and 2034 Winter Games will take place during the month of April 2024.

Less than six years before the first targeted Olympic and Paralympic deadline and approximately three months before the official designation of the Hosts of the two editions mentioned, the Future Host Commission of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) will in fact travel to the territories proposed to receive the competitions following Milan-Cortina 2026.

Earlier this month, the Lausanne (Switzerland) institution and the Salt Lake City – Utah 2034 Bid Committee announced that the summit visit would take place from April 9 to 13. This week, the IOC confirmed that a trip to the French Alps would also take place in April, foreshadowing the next stages of a process that has been disrupted many times.

Based on the inspection of the sites and the study of the technical files, the Future Host Commission will then draw up a report during the spring, before formulating a recommendation for the attention of the IOC Executive Commission during the the meeting of the body planned for June 12-14, 2024.

Finally, just over a month later – on July 24 – the IOC Session meeting in the French capital on the sidelines of the Opening Ceremony of the Paris 2024 Games will officially decide on the identity of the organizers of the 2030 Olympic Games and of the 2034 Olympic Games, in accordance with the principle of double attribution already initiated for the 2024-2028 summer deadlines and again adopted to designate the Hosts of the next two winter meetings.

But before that, and even before the visits of the Future Host Commission, the two applications will have to establish their respective projects, with – after sending the main technical elements at the end of February – the transmission of refined concepts and above all the provision of institutional guarantees and financial by March 29.

Karl Stoss, President of the Future Host Commission, at the podium of the 141st IOC Session, in Bombay, India, Sunday October 15, 2023 (Credits – IOC / Greg Martin)

If the IOC chose at the end of last year to enter into a targeted dialogue with the French Alps on the one hand and Salt Lake City on the other, the two files do not however have the same level of development, the City Host of the 2002 Olympics having worked to build a solid concept for more than a decade, while the tricolor project was only formalized by the competent authorities in mid-July 2023.

However, before the end of the semester, both files must be able to meet the requirements of the IOC and the International Federations, although discussions may continue beyond the attribution of the Games.

The fundamentals must therefore be consolidated and the major problems resolved.

For the French Alps candidacy – which underwent a recent technical visit – this will particularly concern the snow pole, in the north, with the inclusion or not of Val d’Isère (Savoie) among the sites mobilized to receive part of the events alpine skiing. This will also concern two sensitive points at the level of the ice center facing more towards Nice (Alpes-Maritimes), with, in addition to the question of the temporary or relocated Speed ​​Ring, the problem of a new arena to complete the necessary system at the home of ice hockey on the shores of the Mediterranean.

Proof in any case that several points remain unresolved for the French project, the IOC has not yet announced precise dates for the visit to France by the Future Host Commission.

As Mark Adams, Director of Communications of the Olympic institution, declared:

Dates and details are currently being discussed by both teams.

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