Almaty and Beijing Ready for IOC Session -- On the Scene

(ATR) IOC members are gathering in Kuala Lumpur for the 128th Session that will decide the host city for the 2022 Winter Olympics.

The vote comes on July 31, but the bid teams from Almaty and Beijing are well under way with rehearsals for their final presentations to IOC members.

ATR stole a look inside the brightly-lit presentation auditorium at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre (KLCC) Monday, the venue where the 2022 bids will make their last-ditch 45-minute appeals on Friday morning. Rehearsals were taking place and will continue through the week.

ATR is told that Almaty and Beijing each have bid delegations of around 100 officials, swelled by PR and support staff.Both bids have officials spread around the Traders Hotel, Mandarin Oriental and Grand Hyatt, all linked by walkways to the KLCC.

Beijing 2022 holds its first media briefings in Kuala Lumpur today. Almaty has only two scheduled this week before the vote - on Wednesday and Thursday.

Under cloudy skies in the muggy Malaysian capital, where temperatures are set to hover around 32 °C all week and daily showers are expected, the compact venue set-up for the IOC Session will be welcomed by all participants.

The KLCC is also the venue for presentations and the vote on the 2020 Winter Youth Olympic Games host. Brasov, Romania and Lausanne are the candidate cities.

Bach Takes Up Badminton

The IOC president was welcomed to Kuala Lumpur by Malaysian member Prince Tunku Imran two days ago. And ahead of the IOC Executive Board meeting that precedes the Session, Thomas Bach got a taste for sport Malaysian-style.

On Monday, he visited the Bukit Kiara Sports Complex, currently used by the Badminton Association of Malaysia as its national training and administration center. He played and chatted with some young players and also met the Malaysian Youth Olympic Games ambassador.

Boston 2024 on IOC Agenda?

The 2024 Olympic bidding process could be a late addition to the agenda if the U.S. Olympic Committee Board drops the embattled Boston effort. The USOC’s top officials willdecide the fate of the bid at a meeting later Monday.

The assessment of one IOC member about Boston 2024 to Around the Rings: "What a mess".

IOC vice-president John Coates told ATR that the IOC is closely monitoring the outcome of today’s USOC/Boston 2024 teleconference.

"We clearly hope that there is an American bid," he said. "The U.S. Olympic Committee and Boston 2024 folk themselves can be the best judge of whether they should go ahead."

Having met six weeks ago in Lausanne, there are no pressing items scheduled for discussion at the two-day IOC EB meeting. Tuesday and Wednesday's business is fairly straightforward.

The summer and winter international federations will report to the IOC’s ruling body on Tuesday. Bach and his colleagues are also expecting updates from ANOC, the athletes’ commission and WADA.

A progress report on the implementation of Olympic Agenda 2020 is planned along with a review of the re-election of members at the Session, which runs from July 31 to Aug. 3. Two new IOC members are proposed with 15 seeking another term

Wednesday’s schedule is devoted to reports from the organizing committees of the next three Olympics in Rio, PyeongChang and Tokyo, and the YOG in Lillehammer.

Bach will hold a press conference Wednesday at 14:00 local time.

A joint meeting of the IOC and the Association of Summer Olympic International Federations comes on Thursday.The opening ceremony of the IOC Session takes place at the convention center at 20:00.

After Friday’s vote on the 2020 YOG and 2022 Winter Olympic cities - slated for shortly after 16:00 - the announcement ceremony is set for a 17:30-18:00 slot.

Agenda 2020 implementation is high up on the agenda of the IOC Session, which reconvenes Saturday and runs through Monday.

Reported in Kuala Lumpur by Mark Bisson

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