According to the Denver Post, Metro Sports Commission board of directors chairman Rob Cohen said Tuesday he would like Denver to be considered for the 2018 Winter Olympic Games after the U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) formally announced it has named Denver its eighth “Community Partner City”, a crucial step in the city’s bid to become the U.S. candidate for the 2018 Winter Games.
Cohen said, “once you get in that bidding game on an international level, which we are now, you can’t possibly help but start thinking about bidding on the ultimate grand prize. If the USOC were to decide on the 2018 Winter Olympics, of course we’d like to be considered as a contender. I’d be misleading many of you if I said we haven’t been thinking about and dreaming about and wondering whether we would have the opportunity to bid on the Winter Games. But that ultimate decision is not ours. (The USOC) would have to invite us to that process”.
He added, “we have had an exploratory committee working for the last two years to bid on international events”.
The partnership could help bring more events to Denver, along with more training facilities for elite athletes.
But the Rocky Mountain News says that Denver would face a major roadblock. Colorado voters dismissed the 1976 Games, based on environmental and financial concerns, an unprecedented move that enraged the IOC.
Cohen said, “clearly, if there’s a 2018 process, the Denver 1976 issue would have to be addressed. We won’t run from our history. We will address it head-on, we will talk about the Denver of today”.
USOC chief executive Jim Scherr said Denver ranks at “the forefront” of potential American sites.
He said, “Denver has, obviously, great mountain settings and resorts. The winter venues have proven that they can host major international skiing events and be successful. Then you have the population base in Denver, and the athletic facilities, hotel infrastructure, convention centre….”
