Chris Rudge, chief executive officer of the Canadian Olympic Committee (COC), said Canada is considering a bid for the 2022 Winter Olympic Games.
The 2018 Games might be too soon after the Vancouver 2010 Games, but Rudge said Tuesday, “I’m not sure there’s any precedent for a Games being that close in a country, certainly a Winter Games, but there’s no question that we are looking at when the next time to bid might be. I think that our general belief is that ’22 is not unreasonable”, he said.
CTV reports Rudge said interest remains in having Quebec City represent Canada in a 2022 bid. “Quite frankly, knowing the charm of Quebec City, it would certainly be a tremendous environment in which to host a Winter Games”.
Quebec City was Canada’s official candidate for the 2002 Games won by Salt Lake City. The city tried to represent Canada for the 2010 Games but Vancouver’s bid won out, reports CTV.
But Rudge added if the decision is made to bid for 2022, any Canadian city will be eligible to submit a bid to the COC for consideration, which is a normal process. “The winner of that round then goes ahead with a bid to the IOC”, he said.
Rudge called it a strategic decision that Toronto is bidding for the 2015 Pan Am Games. He said the decision was made on the basis that a bid from the area would help develop badly needed resources for summer sports. The Pan Am bid is reportedly also seen as a way to prepare Toronto to host a Summer Games.
But Rudge said the decision around whether the next Games bid from Canada should be for summer or winter would depend on whether the bid was winnable. “We’ve gone twice in Toronto and lost, we’ve had more success attracting Winter Games and perhaps one of the reasons is we have such a good track record of hosting Games. There may be a preference to give us the winter over summer, I don’t know. We haven’t put ourselves in a position yet of choosing one or the other”, he said.
