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Toronto Strong Contender For Olympic Games - IOC President

Chicago will lose the 2016 games. Tokyo will win.
Why Toronto is going for any other games besides the Olympics is beyond me. We're too big for anything smaller than that. Toronto likes to think big but act small. It's very odd.
 
I don't mind bidding, as it is good, cheap exposure and it tends to get people excited about improving the city. I'm not convinced we would win, though. We can only hope that Chicago loses.
 
Its between Tokyo and Chicago. Rio could play spoiler to the Chicago bid.
 
jn_12 said:
In all honesty, why would Chicago lose? I'd say they're the front runners.
Click to expand...

The score that the IOC gave the cities says otherwise. As of June 2008, Tokyo was the front-runner.

Tokyo — scored 8.3 (bid details)
Madrid — scored 8.1 (bid details)
Chicago — scored 7.0 (bid details)
Rio de Janeiro — scored 6.4 (bid details)
Doha — scored 6.9 (bid details)
Prague — scored 5.3 (bid details)
Baku — scored 4.3 (bid details)

However, this was when G W Bush was in power and the US's foreign policy was hurting Chicago's bid. But a lot has changed especially since Obama (a Chicagoan) was elected.

Personally I think Rio may get it in the end. Asia just hosted the summer games, and South America has never done it before. Brazil is coming forth in leaps and bounds and it shows. They want to have their time in the sun after many decades of obscurity. The IOC has already declared them "a dark horse that may yet ride away with the competition."

But I think we can all agree that if Chicago wins, Toronto can kiss 2020 or 2024 goodbye.
 
I don't mind bidding, as it is good, cheap exposure and it tends to get people excited about improving the city.
Click to expand...

Interesting piece of trivia: Detroit was a bidder for the 1944, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968 and 1972 Summer Olympic Games (and came in second for the 1964 games after Tokyo, and 1968 games after Mexico City).

Today it seems like Doha (Qatar) is a city that is doing just that. Why a city with a population of 500,000 is bidding for the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup all at the same time is beyond me.
 
I hope Rio gets it, but Tokyo is probably the most competent to host it. My concern there would be if Tokyo gets ignored because Beijing just had the Olympics and Asia had been done. The same would go for Madrid in that case, thanks to London, leaving it a showdown between Rio & Chicago.

I can't really see Obama being a major factor in a 2016 bid. If the IOC has any foresight, they will figure out that by 2016 Obama's (theoretical) second term will be ending and will probably see his public appeal drop to Bill Clinton levels.
 
we're pursuing the pan am games right now because it's both economically and politically viable. the price tag for the pan ams is 2 billion or less. the marketing, campaigning and new infrastructure necessary for an enormous world event like the olympics would necessarily be much higher.

also, by some divine miracle, all three levels of government, including several governments across the golden horseshoe, have pledged funding.

perhaps most importantly, as a host for the olympics currently, canada would not be successful in its medal tally. remember, canada is only now becoming a winter athletic power. this has surely been a product of freak-like increased investment and the infrastructure first built in calgary. the infrastructure that would be built in ontario would certainly be "legacy" infrastructure as mr. mcguinty put it.

we all know toronto wants the olympics, and if this bid is successful, a beautiful games compounded with new infrastructure will put toronto in the front running for an olympics.
 
If Chicago loses 2016, perhaps Rogge is hinting that 2020 would be Toronto's to lose (something like Rio 2016, Pyongchang 2018, Toronto 2020 would be a viable global rotation).

Canada became a Winter Olympic power not just because of Calgary's legacy but because the number of medals up for grabs has almost tripled since the 60s...2/3 of our medals in 2006 were won by women, most of them in events that were rather recent additions. Being virtually guaranteed 2 curling medals, for instance, will give us roughly 10% more medals right off the bat.

If we do bid, I wonder if we'd reuse old plans (including Pan Am plans if we don't win that) or start totally fresh.
 
I'd be floored if we didn't win the Pan Am Games. Unless it became obvious that we weren't serious about it... but I have a feeling that even a half-hearted Toronto Pan Ams would be successful by their standard.
 
wyliepoon said:
Interesting piece of trivia: Detroit was a bidder for the 1944, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968 and 1972 Summer Olympic Games (and came in second for the 1964 games after Tokyo, and 1968 games after Mexico City).

Today it seems like Doha (Qatar) is a city that is doing just that. Why a city with a population of 500,000 is bidding for the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup all at the same time is beyond me.
Click to expand...

Countries bid for World Cups not cities....in fact, one of the bid measurement criteria is not having too many games in any one city.
 
khristopher said:
Chicago will lose the 2016 games. Tokyo will win.
Why Toronto is going for any other games besides the Olympics is beyond me. We're too big for anything smaller than that. Toronto likes to think big but act small. It's very odd.
Click to expand...

I think it is essential that we host something else if we are going to be taken seriously (presuming that is what we want) as an Olympic bidder.

As far as a I can recall, the biggest sporting events that we have ever hosted was the world basketball championships and we were one of the 6 host cities for the Under - 21 World Cup of Soccer.....hardly sparkling credentials for a Olympic bid city with an obvious gap in sporting infrastructure (so we lack any demonstable experience in building infrastructure on on time and organizing a large event)....when you toss in our willingness/desire to give opponents to any bid equal time/exposure/say (I am not criticizing that but we have to recognized that, for example, the opponents to Bejing's bid were never heard) that vocal minority makes it look (to the rest of the world) that we are a city that has never built sporting infrastructure or hosted games because the people here don't want to.

Until we find a way to break that perception (and I don't think the Toronto way is to silence the critics) then we will likely not win an olympic bid. So, perhaps, the way to do it is to host a smaller event (Commonwealth Games or Pan Ams seem obvious) to show the world we can and to show our internal critics that doing so does not mean the ruination of our society!

Just one man's opinion.
 
urbanboom said:
The score that the IOC gave the cities says otherwise. As of June 2008, Tokyo was the front-runner.

Tokyo — scored 8.3 (bid details)
Madrid — scored 8.1 (bid details)
Chicago — scored 7.0 (bid details)
Rio de Janeiro — scored 6.4 (bid details)
Doha — scored 6.9 (bid details)
Prague — scored 5.3 (bid details)
Baku — scored 4.3 (bid details)

However, this was when G W Bush was in power and the US's foreign policy was hurting Chicago's bid. But a lot has changed especially since Obama (a Chicagoan) was elected.

Personally I think Rio may get it in the end. Asia just hosted the summer games, and South America has never done it before. Brazil is coming forth in leaps and bounds and it shows. They want to have their time in the sun after many decades of obscurity. The IOC has already declared them "a dark horse that may yet ride away with the competition."

But I think we can all agree that if Chicago wins, Toronto can kiss 2020 or 2024 goodbye.
Click to expand...

sigh...
Since when do these rankings have to do with anything? IOC members do not vote based on these results. They never have (otherwise Toronto would have hosted an Olympics by now because we outranked Beijing and Atlanta). In fact, these rankings mean so little that Rio got through to the final four despite being worse than Doha (mind you Doha wanted to host the event in October, but that seems like a strawman if I've ever seen one). For 2012, Paris outranked London and for 2014 Salzberg and PyeongChang outranked Sochi. So if thats the best you've got, keep searching.

Fact is, the IOC is out for money. If they think they can get the best TV ratings and the most sponsorship contracts from an American bid, they're going to pick it. They already gushed over Obama and his support of the bid.

If Tokyo or Rio win it'll be as big of an upset as Sydney was over Beijing.
 
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