Samaranch Jr. Promises Austerity Bid as Fears Grow for Madrid 2020

(ATR) IOC member Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr. tells Around the Rings that Madrid 2020 can weather Spain's deepening financial crisis with a "very low cost, extremely efficient" Olympic bid.

Despite growing speculation that Madrid may have to drop out of the three-city race, Samaranch claimed Spain's rising borrowing costs would not force the capital to withdraw from the contest.

He acknowledged that the main concern was lack of confidence in refinancing Spain's outstanding public debt "that will require a Europe-wide solution in the coming weeks and months".

"We believe that it will not be a significant part of the equation when we get to the important part of the bidding. It will be behind us," Samaranch told ATR.

But with Spain's worsening financial crisis hitting public services, opposition to spending on the Olympic bid is set to grow in the coming months.

The son of the former IOC president, who was voted Thursday on to the IOC Executive Board at the 124th Session in London, admitted concern.

"Of course, I have worries. It is not a comfortable situation where we stand with Spain's difficulties to finance itself," Samaranch said.

"It affects all aspects of life, it affects the bid, of course, but we are confident that our bid is financially wise...most of the hard part of organizing the Games is already paid for."

At a Madrid 2020 press conference Thursday on the Olympic Park, the Spanish government through secretary of state for sport Miguel Cardenal underlined its commitment to the Olympic bid, despite the country's economic woes.

"We are going to make out of necessity, virtue," Samaranch told ATR in an exclusive interview.

"The new thing in Olympic bidding is going to be austerity, it's going to be low cost, it's going to be making sure that not one single dollar is thrown out of the window, that everything is reused and everything makes a lot of sense," he explained.

"Our bid is very, very good at that. We believe that with the current infrastructure built, with the current stadiums and sites already in place, we can do a very low cost extremely efficient and very good bid."

He added: "It might be we create some new ideas that stick in the Olympic Movement for a while."

At today's Madrid briefing, Cardenal, bid president Alejandro Blanco, CEO Victor Sanchez and Madrid mayor Ana Botella were hit with a barrage of questions about the impact of Spain's financial collapse on the nation's third consecutive Olympics campaign.

With about 75 percent of all venues complete, they emphasized that the bid would only proceed with building that which was absolutely necessary. They said 80 percent of investments needed were already in place. Drawing on their experience of the Barcelona 1992 Olympics, the Madrid officials said they were convinced a bid win would stimulate the failing economy.

Samaranch insisted that Madrid 2020's bid was continually developing to make the bid to more cost-effective.

"We never stopped moving in that direction," he said. "We continue our evolution, every day our teams are looking at how to make it more efficient. No matter what it takes, any opportunity that we find to make it wise, intelligent, smart and efficient we will go for it."

Reported in London by Mark Bisson and Kathy Kuzcka

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