Ex-Bid Chief Urges Germany to Go for 2026 Winter Olympics

(ATR) Hamburg’s former bid leader tells Around the Rings that Germany should bid for the 2026 Winter Olympics despite the referendum defeat that halted the 2024 effort.

"I think they should go for it," said Nikolas Hill, who was chief executive of the Hamburg bid which collapsed following a referendum defeat last November.

"I think it’s necessary for the sports family in Germany to have a goal worth reaching for and [Olympic] values behind that," he said, highlighting the importance of sport to the public and the role it can play in helping in the integration of refugees in Germany amid the global migration crisis.

In November, Hill described the shock defeat for Hamburg’s Olympic ambitions – 51.6 percent of city residents opposed the bid – as "a bitter pill for us to swallow".

Speaking exclusively to ATR on Friday, Hill suggested that the blow for German sport should not prevent a bid for the 2026 Winter Olympics.

But he said German Olympic officials, stakeholders and the public should think "very carefully" about the arguments for bidding for the Games again. To avoid a repeat of Hamburg’s experience, he said whichever candidate city might be chosen they should be convinced "right from the beginning that this is a good idea to go for that".

The German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB) hasn’t ruled out a 2026 bid. Olympic committees in Canada, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland are also considering a tilt at the Winter Games after PyeongChang 2018.

The DOSB’s Supervisory Board launched its postmortem on Hamburg 2024’s failure in December. The review process is ongoing, said a DOSB spokesman.

Asked if there was any talk of Germany pitching for the 2026 Olympics, he said: "We are still discussing the outcome of the [Hamburg] bid."

Costly Failure

One thing is clear though. Hamburg’s Olympic bid was a costly venture for the Hanseatic city.

Sports minister Thomas de Maizière has told the Senate of Hamburg that the federal government will not contribute to the estimated $14.4 million (12.6 million euros) cost of the failed Olympic quest.

Hill confirmed this, telling ATR that the federal government had agreed from the bid launch to contribute funding only in 2016 and 2017, if Hamburg 2024 overcame the referendum hurdle.

For the DOSB’s part, the spokesman said: "We have made clear in the public from the very beginning that the costs of the bid would have to be shared among city, federal states, federal government and private contributions."

The public’s rejection of the Hamburg bid means the city is left to foot much of the bill.

Hill said the bid company expenses were around $6.2 million, while around three million dollars was spent on the referendum and considerably more invested in planning the bid concept. Sponsorship and private donations offered only a few million dollars to the bid kitty. It leaves taxpayers to pick up a sizable chunk of the $14.4 million.

At a DOSB board meeting this week, CEO Michael Vesper’s contract was extended until the end of 2017. The 64-year-old has led the NOC since its formation in 2006, first as director general and in 2014 as CEO following structural reforms.

"The task now is to set the foundations for the realignment of the DOSB in general and in particular the control and promotion of competitive sports," Vesper said in a statement.

Reported by Mark Bisson and Heinz Peter Kreuzer

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