Qatar trying to make use of World Cup as springboard for 2036 Olympics bid | World Cup 2022
Subsequent cease: the 2036 Olympics. Qatar believes the World Cup has gone so properly that it may be a springboard to internet hosting the largest sporting occasion of all. The Guardian understands the nation is able to flex its muscle mass once more and bid to stage the Video games within the autumn of 2036, regardless of having failed thrice prior to now.
These earlier bids fell brief due partly to scepticism from inside the Worldwide Olympic Committee that such a small nation had the infrastructure to stage an occasion that pulls 10,500 athletes throughout 32 sports activities, together with tens of millions of spectators. Nonetheless there’s rising optimism in Doha that this World Cup affords proof to the IOC that Qatar can ship an Olympics-style idea, with a number of venues in a single main metropolis.
At this stage it’s understood Qatar needs to go it alone. However it’s possible that there can be folks in Olympic circles who will put stress on Qatar’s Olympic Committee to have a joint Center East bid with Saudi Arabia. It was additionally maybe notable that Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, who has been a member of the IOC since 2002, has posed with a Saudi flag at this World Cup.
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Given the excessive temperatures in Qatar in the course of the summer season, the occasion must be shifted to the autumn. Nonetheless it could not be the primary time that has occurred: the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo started on 10 October, whereas each Seoul 1988 and Sydney 2000 began in mid September.
Qatar would look to increase its use of air-conditioned stadiums, which have proved so profitable at this World Cup, to the programs of different outside venues. Such a state of affairs would allow it to keep away from the harrowing scenes that marred the ladies’s marathon on the 2019 World Athletics Championships, when almost half the sector dropped out as a result of excessive warmth and humidity regardless of the race beginning on the Corniche simply earlier than midnight.
Regardless of Qatar’s optimism, any bid would inevitably face a number of challenges. The Olympic group has way more out LGBTQ+ athletes than soccer, and they’re more likely to specific far deeper reservations on the prospect of the Video games being staged in a rustic the place being homosexual is criminalised.
The IOC would additionally not countenance any of its sponsors having its merchandise eliminated simply days earlier than the Video games started, as Budweiser confronted right here after the Qataris imposed an alcohol ban on spectators at stadiums. The IOC president, Thomas Bach, can be regarded as cool on any Qatar bid. Nonetheless, he is because of step down in 2025, a yr earlier than the choice on the place to stage the 2036 Video games is more likely to be made.
There can be logistical challenges too, together with how you can host a mountain bike competitors in a rustic the place the very best level is 338 toes above sea stage. Nonetheless, Qatar will argue that a lot of the lodging, transport and stadia can be already in place to stage a future Video games, though a brand new Olympic stadium must be constructed provided that the Khalifa Worldwide Stadium, which staged the World Athletics Championships in 2019, has a capability of simply over 45,000.
Different international locations anticipated to bid for the 2036 Video games embrace India, Indonesia and Turkey.
