The Budapest 2024 team, led by Chairman of the Bid Committee, Balázs Fürjes, has reported a highly successful 14th SportAccord Convention.
According to Budapest 2024, Initiatives such as the Sports Demo Zone, the Post-Match Mixed Zone and Speaker’s Corner made this SportAccord event especially collaborative, and with over 100 International Sports Federations in attendance, the climate for knowledge sharing was ideal.
The convention was held this year in the Olympic Capital of Lausanne, Switzerland after Sochi withdrew from hosting the event. It was also announced that next year the event will take place in Aarhus, Denmark – almost 200 kilometers from Copenhagen.
László Vajda, Chief Operating Officer of the Bid Committee, said he was extremely satisfied with the progress of ongoing conversations that were continued in Lausanne. He said “Sport is, of course, at the heart of our bid and so our team has been maximizing the vast wealth of knowledge and cooperation within the sport community who have gathered here this week. Dialogue and learning are values that we find widely expressed at SportAccord, and these values are also deeply important to Hungary and Hungarians. We have had an exceptionally productive week both here and at home, as bid leadership speakers have also been presenting to the American Chamber of Commerce, CEOs of major companies and diplomats in Budapest.”
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) permitted bid delegations to attend the convention as an information gathering experience, but denied them the opportunity to actively campaign. High-level delagations from all of the bids attended including Paris Mayor Ann Hidalgo.
The official public launch of the Budapest Bid last week coincided with the celebration of Hungary’s role as a founder member of the modern Olympics and the first gold medal ever won for the country in the 1896 Olympic Games. Games planning has been underway since November last year.
Budapest is competing with Paris, Los Angeles and Rome for the 2024 Olympics. A decision by the IOC will be made in September 2017.
