Pan Am Report - Toronto Takes Over From Guadalajara

(ATR) With a tip of the sombrero to Mexico for a successful Pan American Games, the Americas and Caribbean shift their focus north to Toronto for the next edition in four years.

The capital of Ontario – and the largest city in Canada – will host the 17th Pan American Games from July 10 to 26 of 2015.Toronto organizers are aiming to make the event even more meaningful as a pre-Olympic competition and hope the mid-summer dates and location will attract some of the world's biggest stars who skipped Guadalajara.

"One of the objectives we have is to increase the number of events which are Olympic qualifying," Toronto 2015 CEO Ian Troop tells Around the Rings.

Fifteen of the 26 Olympic sports had Olympic berths at stake in 2011. Basketball has been mentioned as a sport that could use the Pan Ams as an Olympic qualifying tournament to increase its level of competition. The United States, which sent NBA D-League players, managed only a bronze medal.

Troop says Toronto will work with Canada and the U.S. to make sure their best athletes come. That will be difficult given that world championships in athletics and swimming will be held in 2015, and the swimming dates are almost a direct conflict.

"We've got a lot of advantages," Troop says. "We're a very friendly location from a U.S. standpoint. When I talk to the USOC, they say, 'This is a home games for us.' We need to exploit that. It is certainly a home games for Canada. And for all countries, this is the last major multi-sport Games before Rio. And we are selling hard the idea this is an important preparatory step for your teams on the road to Rio."

Troop says he had some talks with FINA, led by Julio Maglione of Uruguay, about the swimming competition while he was in Guadalajara.

"It's relationship building at international federation level," he says. "It's looking at schedules and it's working all those factors to get into what will be the optimal event with the right athletes."

The World Aquatics Championships in Kazan, Russia are scheduled from July 20 to Aug. 2.

"Our swimming goes first on July 10," Troop says, "so if they push swimming to late in the program at the World Championships, they've got over two weeks to recover and get over to Kazan. I'm not saying that's the plan. I'm saying that's the kind of things you need to work on."

Swimming Canada CEO Pierre Lafontaine tells ATR that he is hoping the scheduling will allow Canada's A team to compete in Toronto. "We're saying this is the Olympic qualifying for synchro, for water polo," he says. "It would be terrible if the host nation wouldn't be supporting their event with their best team."

The world's most famous Olympic athlete, Usain Bolt of Jamaica, never had the Pan Ams on his radar screen because they are so late in the year. Bolt competed in the World Championships in Daegu, which ended Sept. 4, and then finished his season in September.

"All the top athletes, for them, it's their offseason," Don Anderson, first vice-president of the Jamaica Olympic Association and chef de mission for London 2012, tells ATR. "It's too late in the year. It's a big problem that we have with most of these Games nowadays. October is not a good time of year."

He says there is a better chance for top athletes to compete in Toronto because the Pan Ams will be in July, and "obviously there is a different kind of appeal in Toronto."

Taking a Close Look

Although Toronto mayor Rob Ford and sports minister Bal Gosal had prominent roles in the traditional handover ceremony, including the mayor brandishing the Pan American Games flag, the major work of organizing the event falls to Troop.

The budget is $1.4 billion and the Games are expected to create 15,000 jobs. An additional 20,000 people will be recruited as volunteers.

Troop spent considerable time in Guadalajara. He co-hosted with 2015 chair Roger Garland a fancy dinner reception for PASO dignitaries before the Games began, then participated in the "observer" program. Troop and his team wanted to learn everything about how the Games operate. "That means tearing it apart and looking at it step-by-step," he says.

The Canadians took note of signage directing spectators at the venues – an area that left room for improvement in Guadalajara –as well as seating, training sites, medical facilities and presentation of the sports.

"In general, the fields of play are terrific and that sort of reaffirms how you can lay out and execute a Games,"Troop says.

He was impressed by the passion and spirit of the Mexican fans and expects more diverse cheering sections in his city.

"Given thediversity of Toronto and the region, with 46 percent of our region born outside of Canada and a large Latin and Caribbean population, we have 10,000 people from El Salvador, we have 15,000 Chileans, we have large populations of people," he says.

"One of the things we have to do is reach out to those communities, get them organized, so they can welcome the teams when they land at the airport, they can host them for something and of course be volunteers and come out to support the team."

He says he expects fans to cheer for Canada when its athletes play and for their country of origin when the Canucks are not on the field.

This will be the third time Canada has hosted the Pan American Games. Winnipeg was the host in 1967 and 1999.

Venues in Flux

Toronto is looking for a new home for the velodrome after the recent decision by Hamilton not to host the cycling events, but Troop says that is no cause for alarm. He says that in the 1988 Calgary Winter Olympics, the only venue that stayed the same from the bid book was the Saddledome. At the 2010 Vancouver Games, 65 percent of the venues changed.

Troop says Toronto will start making venue announcements this month.

"We're very comfortable," he says. "Maybe one or two (venues) are still being defined. We talked about 52 in the bid book.We're below that now aswe consolidate, simplify and use clustering. The vast majority we know where they are going to be.Many of the bid book ideas were the right ones. And there's going to be some things which move. We feel very confident we'll have an outstanding plan that builds from a lot of good work in the bid, that simplifies and creates an enhanced athlete and spectator experience."

Troop says communities are showing interest in claiming the velodrome. "It's a terrific model," he says. "We've got a cost-effective capital side of things. We really understand how you drive revenue to make it sustainable, which means you've got cycling, but you've got to have the infield fully programmed as well. We really thank Hamilton for a lot of hard work with us to get to that point where we have a very viable, bona fide model. This will be only the second 250-meter track in the whole of North America. And our national team has already agreed to make that their new home instead of Carson, Calif., which makes all the sense in the world."

Finishing in Time

The athletics track and the velodrome in Guadalajara were certified the Tuesday before the opening ceremony. Troop says Toronto started moving on venues right away. "My first hires were in the infrastructure side," he says.

Construction is expected to start on Toronto's five big builds in 2012. "We expect to be ready in 2014, which will be a full year in advance of our Games, which allows us to do test events and be ready in plenty of time," Troop adds.

Marketing Movement

Toronto will announce two major sponsors this month.

"We benefit from coming right after Vancouver," Troop says. "The sponsors with Vancouver found it to be a very good experience."

He says Vancouver had had more than 65 different companies involved and Toronto expects to be in that range.

"We feel good that our sponsorship program will result in very robust, capable sponsors who can help us activate these Games and help build their businesses as well," he says.

However, more Canadians have to become aware of the Pan American Games, which will be the biggest event ever hosted in Canada (larger than the 1976 Montreal Olympics and 2010 Vancouver Winter Games). A recent survey of 1,500 Canadians said only 40 percent were aware they were hosting the 2015 Games, and Troop hopes to increase that awareness to 85 percent by 2014.

Olympic Aspirations?

Before winning the Pan American Games, Toronto bid unsuccessfully for the Olympics in 1996 and 2008. Rio also launched failed Olympic bids until using the Pan Ams as a springboard to winning the 2016 Games.

Does Toronto consider the Pan Ams a steppingstone for getting the Olympics?

"Certainly people ask me that question quite a bit," Troop says. "I'd have to say that our focus is on putting on an outstanding Pan Am Games. I think Rio did that themselves in '07. And what I'd like to see happen is after we're finished, our community and our politicians and our leaders look at each other and say, 'That was so terrific, let's go for the Olympics.' And I think that is our legacy."

Reported by Karen Rosen.

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