The London 2012 Olympic Games Days To Go

Tyson Gay, Allison Felix, Sanya Richards, Asafa Powell and Blanca Vlasic all established themselves as the best in the world after Athens 2004, dominated their events and gave themselves the opportunity to become individual Olympic champions. They all failed in Beijing, and that was not good for the sport. Athletics needs stars who are world figures because of their dominance.

Usain Bolt, of course, is such a figure now. He came to Beijing to run in three events and left with three gold medals and three world records. With his performances in the 100 metres, 200m, and 4 x 100m relay he established himself as the undisputed fastest man in the world and a sportsman who has transcended track and field to become a celebrity known all over the planet.

It was a very different Olympics for athletics, with the Americans losing some of their traditional dominance in the sprints. They still managed to finish on par with their normal medal haul, thanks to medals in non-traditional events like the women's hammer. The tiny nation of Jamaica gained worldwide attention through Bolt, Melanie Walker in the 400m hurdles, and a clean sweep in the women's 100m.

Jamaica have come under scrutiny because of their unprecedented medal haul and the fact that they do not have an independent drug-testing agency. That is a problem that needs repairing quickly, especially given all the recent doping scandals in this sport. But to be fair, it should also be noted that the Jamaicans have not come from nowhere. They have always been strong and have always been in position to win gold medals in the sprints, hurdles and relays based on a long tradition of athletics being the national sport.

The other big difference in Beijing was that, for the first time, athletics took a back seat to swimming and gymnastics. Take Bolt out of the equation and athletics would not have a chance of regaining the status it once had.

The British athletics squad had performed well below expectations in 2004, but then had promising performances at the European, Commonwealth, and 2007 World Championships. However, they again failed to bring home the medals on the biggest stage – Christine Ohuruogu was the lone gold medallist.

Looking ahead to London 2012, the Americans will certainly want to re-establish their dominance of the sprints but will have a tough time of it with the Jamaicans now inspiring a whole new generation of their athletes to train harder and believe they can win Olympic gold.

The British team will have to take a very hard and serious look at restructuring their programme, taking those athletes who are identified as potential medallists and putting them in situations that are proven to help athletes reach and perform to their potential.

I do not believe that expertise exists in the UK at this point and there is not enough time to develop it. British athletes must train harder and smarter in order to stay healthy, compete more on the international circuit to gain top level experience and develop a tougher attitude to compete with the American, Caribbean and African athletes who generally approach competition with a tougher attitude and approach.

The Jamaicans will not be the only team the Americans and the British will have to battle with. Other small nations such as Trinidad and Tobago, the Bahamas and Nigeria have always been positioned to get athletes into finals and will be inspired by what they saw from the Jamaicans this year.

Looking ahead to 2012, it could prove even more difficult to win athletics medals for Americans and Britons than in Beijing or Athens.

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Main articles: 2012 Summer Olympics bids and London 2012 Olympic bid

By the bid submission deadline of 15 July 2003, nine cities had submitted bids to host the 2012 Olympics. These cities were Havana, Istanbul, Leipzig, London, Madrid, Moscow, New York, Paris and Rio de Janeiro.^[6]

On 18 May 2004, the International Olympic Committee (IOC), as a result of a scored technical evaluation, reduced the number of cities to five: London, Madrid, Moscow, New York, and Paris.^[7]

By 19 November 2004 all five candidate cities had submitted their candidate file to the International Olympic Committee. The IOC inspection team visited the five candidate cities during February and March 2005. The Paris bid suffered two set-backs during the IOC inspection visit: a number of strikes and demonstrations coinciding with the visits and a report coming out that Guy Drut, one of the key members of the Paris bid team and IOC member, would face charges over alleged corrupt party political finances.^[8]

On 6 June 2005 the International Olympic Committee released its evaluation reports for the five candidate cities. Although these reports did not contain any scores or rankings, the evaluation report for Paris was considered the most positive, now followed closely by London which had narrowed down most of the gap observed by the initial evaluation in 2004 regarding Paris. Also New York and Madrid obtained very positive evaluation reports.^[9]

Throughout the process and up to the vote at the 117th IOC Session, Paris was widely seen as the favourite to win the nomination, particularly as this was its third bid in recent history. Originally London was seen lagging Paris by considerable margin, however this started to improve with the appointment of Sebastian Coe as new head of London 2012 on 19 May 2004. In late August 2004 some reports started emerging predicting a London and Paris tie in the 2012 bid.^[10] In the final run-up to the 117th IOC Session, London and Paris appeared to be increasingly in a neck-and-neck race. On 1 July 2005 Jacques Rogge, when asked who the winner would be, told the assembled press: "I cannot predict it since I don't know how the IOC members will vote. But my gut feeling tells me that it will be very close. Perhaps it will come down to a difference of say ten votes, or maybe less".

On 6 July 2005, the final selection was announced at the Raffles City Convention Centre in Singapore, where the 117th IOC Session was held. Here Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Tony Blair was the only leader of the five candidate cities' countries to make a personal lobby (he had also been the only one to attend the 2004 Olympics).^[11] Moscow was the first city to be eliminated, followed by New York and Madrid. The final two cities left in contention were London and Paris. At the end of the fourth round of voting, London won the right to host the 2012 Games with 54 votes, defeating Paris's 50. Various French publications blamed the Paris loss on French President Jacques Chirac's statements before the vote that "We can't trust people [the British] who have such bad food. After Finland, it's the country with the worst food."^[12] Two current members of the International Olympic Committee are from Finland. Several other news sources cited Bertrand Delanoë's complaint regarding Tony Blair's secret late night meetings with numerous (African) IOC representatives as having a more significant impact on final vote.^[13] When reporting London's win, British media covered the expectant crowds in both France and England (and in the other bid cities), and contrasted the jubilant reaction in London to the reaction of the crowd in Paris, where many had gathered in hope of a French win.^[14][15][16] However, the celebrations in London were overshadowed when London's transport system was attacked less than 24 hours after the announcement.^[17]

In December 2005 it was alleged by Alex Gilady, a senior IOC official, that London had won the right to host the Olympics only because of a voting error. A London 2012 spokesman dismissed this, saying "At the end of the day, it was a secret ballot. This is the opinion of one individual. The result is what matters and we are not going to be drawn into speculation."^[18]

2012 Summer Olympics bidding results
City	NOC	Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4
London	Great Britain	22	27	39	54
Paris	France	21	25	33	50
Madrid	Spain	20	32	31	-
New York City	United States	19	16	-	-
Moscow	Russia	15	-	-	-

Thank you :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Olympic_Games