Geneva: Los Angeles and Paris should edge closer today to both getting Olympic hosting rights. Ahead of a key meeting of the International Olympic Committee executive board, the French capital is now seen as the favourite to host the 2024 Games. But that doesn't mean that LA will get left out in the cold.
The strangest Olympic bidding race in four decades will take clearer shape when the IOC board weighs opening up the 2024 contest to also include the 2028 award in September.
The expected agreement would fulfil IOC President Thomas Bach's wish to avoid making a loser of either world-class candidate, though it must be ratified by the Olympic body's voting members.
By meeting today, the IOC can give the required month notice to upgrade an already scheduled 2024 campaign event in Lausanne into a formal session with rule-changing power. On July 11, up to 95 members are due in Lausanne to see LA and Paris bid leaders present their projects.
The likely process lets IOC members retain their most important job of voting for Olympic hosts on September 13 in Lima, Peru, to open the regular session. That's because the issue of which city gets 2024 and which must wait four more years will not be resolved today.
Still, LA officials have set a tone suggesting they could accept 2028.
That would help give the IOC clarity and security for the next decade after a turbulent period of cost overruns by Olympic host cities and local voters sinking potential bids, including some former rivals in the current contest.
"To be blunt, LA 2024 has never been only about LA or 2024," Casey Wasserman, chairman of the LA 2024 bid, said in a statement yesterday.
"Even when the issue of a dual award for the 2024 and 2028 Games was initially raised, we didn't say it's 'LA first' or it's 'now or never' for LA: that sounds like an ultimatum."
