IOC's Christophe Dubi talks Los Angeles 2028 with two years until Olympics
· Yahoo Sports
International Olympic Committee Executive Director Christophe Dubi spoke with NBCSports.com about preparations for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics with two years to go until the Opening Ceremony.
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This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity:
NBCSports.com: How are preparations going two years out from the LA 2028 Games?
Dubi: If you would take a Games organization manual, you would say do like LA: at the two years mark, make sure that you have sold that many tickets, sponsorship and have a market that is incredibly excited about hosting the event on one side. On the other, having ticked off all the boxes on what you don't see, which is behind the scenes: managing complexities of planning in terms of transport, security, technology and all these others that make the Games complicated to organize. So they master complexity because they have a great team. They sell these Games extremely well. You can see the excitement. So going into the two years mark, I think we are on very strong footing.
NBCSports.com: You mentioned complexities. Can you give me an example of a complexity makes LA different from recent Games?
Dubi: They're big. We have more sports. We have more tickets. We have an added factor of complexity, which is moving around without what we could enjoy in the last Games in Paris of this massive public transportation system, underground in particular.
So, all in all, these Games are incredibly ambitious when it comes to the sport program, the biggest ever — 36 sports and 353 events, number of tickets to be sold, and it's going to be sold out. We can be sure the venues will be very exciting.
But at the same time, you have to bring and service all these people, and the expectations when it comes to the Games are extremely high, right? So I think it's the factor of these numbers and the context in which you deliver. Now, LA is a great city. They have all the greatest minds in the world, including in the tech sector, so we'll find solutions.
NBCSports.com: Let's talk a little about Oklahoma City. What are the hopes and plans for making the athletes and everybody there feel connected to what's going on in Los Angeles?
Dubi: Based on what we've learned in Milano Cortina, our athletes commission has been working with the other athletes commissions as well, and we have a lot of surveys.
What the athletes want is to feel that connection through, one, the Opening Ceremony. The little capsules that we had in Cortina and Livigno, they worked. Could it be better? Yes. But, all in all, the athletes were very satisfied for many of them to be part of that ceremony So there is probably something to do here. Replicate Milano Cortina? I don't know, but there is something to look into.
Then it's in the way we will connect with these athletes each and every day, so that they feel part of the LA Games while being in OKC. That's through maybe fan zones. I say maybe because we should explore it.
Remember the Champions Park in Paris? Well, what if there is a location like this one where you can connect with what happens in LA? Solutions not finalized, but we have learned from Paris, and we have learned from Milano Cortina. We know what the expectations are. Great service to start with, perfect fields of play. That goes without saying. And that connection to feel part of the Olympics. Now OKC will not be the only athletes that are outside of the UCLA village. Let's be clear, we have other villages as well. So the same will have to be replicated.
NBCSports.com: Among the new sports, I think Americans are probably most interested in flag football and the return of baseball and softball. What do we need to see from those sports to boost their chances of staying on the Olympic program?
Dubi: That's one of the big achievements, I think, of Fit for the Future. It's this notion that the program can be established based on very objective criteria. In the end, it boils down to many of them, but those which are based around popularity on TV, on social media will be incredibly important. Full venues of course, and then the excitement that you can create not only in the U.S. but around the world will be essential because, in the end, you have sports which are really interesting by region, but we also need to have that notion of universality and spreading across the host nation. So let's see how they perform Games time. Suffice to say that the bigger number around the five continents, the more chances in the future.
NBCSports.com: At every Games, we have specific events that stand out because of where they're being held, the picturesque nature of it — Cortina for the Alpine skiing, surfing in Tahiti or beach volleyball underneath the Eiffel Tower. Are there any sports or specific events for the LA Games that you are most looking forward to seeing?
Dubi: I know one, but I can't reveal. It's going to be stunning. It's going to be very iconic. The one thing the U.S. and this market has to offer is, of course, locations on the beaches, and that will be formidable, no doubt. But more so, your venues: the swimming pool, the athletics, basketball, probably the best the world can offer, right, for these sports. That's very unique to the U.S. and the LA market. It's going to be a combination of the beaches and some of the most stunning venues, alongside a few gold nuggets that I cannot reveal, but it's going to be spectacular.
NBCSports.com: Is there anything else that we haven't covered that I haven't asked you about, or anything else you want to add?
Dubi: The only other thing that is important for us is the success of the World Cup that is currently ongoing, and learning from FIFA, working with the organizing committee in LA that is connected with the organizing committee of the World Cup, working as well with the State Department. They are very close and looking into all these matters.
That is the next step for us in terms of debriefing from the World Cup, which we can learn a lot from. So that's really important, and it's on the horizon a few weeks from now.
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