Vancouver’s 2010 Olympic bid may have an up-hill battle. According to a published report by Jim Byers in The Toronto Star, Vancouver’s Olympic bid finished narrowly behind Salzburg and Pyeongchang in a secret vote taken by the International Olympic Committee’s executive board.
Sources told The Star that during the vote Wednesday, Salzburg and Pyeongchang each received the maximum of 12 votes and Vancouver got 11. Berne received seven votes.
While Salzburg and Pyeongchang got the maximum 12 votes available, someone on the board voted against Vancouver even being allowed onto the ballot next July. Berne only barely made the short list, writes Byers.
One IOC member who asked to remain anonymous told The Star, “they should thank their lucky stars that the executive didn’t decide in advance to put just two cities on the short list. If they had done that Vancouver would have been going home”.
Sam Corea, a spokesman for Vancouver’s bid told GamesBids.com, “Vancouver 2010 is on the short list of candidate cities for the 2010 Games and that’s a great achievement and accomplishment for Canada’s bid.
“We have received high technical marks in the IOC’s Candidature Acceptance Working Group Report and this reflects the quality of Canada’s bid and the work done to date.
“The campaign to win will last another 10 months. Vancouver 2010 will conduct our campaign in a manner that is consistent with the International Olympic Committee’s rules. No one should underestimate Vancouver’s and Canada’s ability to conduct a formidable international effort to secure the support of the IOC when the vote to select the 2010 host city takes place next July”.
As for Vancouver’s non-existence during the IOC meeting in Lausanne this week while representatives of other 2010 bid cities were lobbying their bids, Vancouver bid president Jack Poole said he’s not too worried.
He told The Star, “we’ll aggressively obey the rules. There were some reports, which I don’t want to comment on, that some cities went over the edge”.
Poole said he doesn’t want to give his international team a high profile, “but they know what they can do directly and what they can indirectly. It’s a political campaign we’re in; we understand that”.
