France presented the Alps’ candidacy for the 2030 Winter Olympics to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on Tuesday, in a “united” manner and with the impression of having “given a good match” according to the French Olympic Committee (CNOSF) and the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region.
“It went well, we had half an hour, we showed (the candidacy) together, united, that’s the message we wanted to give,” commented the president of the Olympic committee David Lappartient, alongside the two regional presidents Renaud Muselier (Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur) and Laurent Wauquiez (Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes) from the CNOSF headquarters in Paris. “There was stress, we really felt like we were taking an exam but we had really prepared. We had a good match,” commented Laurent Wauquiez, who made the introduction in German.
The French Alps submitted their application to the IOC on November 7, with the support of the French state. France will be decided during the IOC Executive Board in Paris from November 29 to December 1, which will decide, on the 29th a priori, with which candidates it will enter the dialogue phase. Serious competitors Sweden and Switzerland also presented their project on Tuesday to the IOC, said David Lappartient. “We responded point by point to all the technical and financial questions that may have been asked,” he added without going into detail.
Marie-Amélie Le Fur, president of the French Paralympic committee, insisted on “support for athletes”. The Olympic biathlon champion, Martin Fourcade, and the Paralympic ski champion Marie Bochet were also present, as well as the Minister of Sports. Around twenty NGOs, elected officials, athletes and scientists recently demanded that the Winter Olympics be “compatible with respecting planetary limits and beneficial for populations and territories”. “We are not among the care bears, we are perfectly aware of what is happening but that is not a reason to stop skiing in the mountains when there is snow,” explained Renaud Muselier.
This is not the opinion of a “no JO” collective: “in 2050 all Alpine glaciers located below 3,400 m altitude will have disappeared. Glaciers are collapsing, rock slides are increasing, high mountain refuges are closing one after the other, but we are told that we will always be able to ski and that we must continue to ski!”, writes he said in a press release on Tuesday. On the financial level, “there are major partners of Paris 2024 who have already said that they are ready to follow us,” assured Laurent Wauquiez, without specifying which ones.