467 days to go
The world's biggest sports convention, SportAccord, was in Beijing this week and gave Bocog a taste of how the Olympics organising machine works once it slips into gear, while also giving the International Olympic Committee a sense of how things are going to be at 8pm on August 8, 2008.
For those unfamiliar with the concept, SportAccord is jointly owned by GAISF, the General Association of International Sports Associations, which represents 100 sports federations; the ASOIF, the Association of Summer Olympic International Sports Federations; and AWOIF, its Winter Olympics counterpart.
One thing everyone is going to have to get used to in the next 15 months is the use of acronyms. There are a bewildering array of different letters and you need to know your NOCs (national Olympic committees) from your Ocogs (organising committees of the Olympic Games).
Most of the delegates attending SportAccord are not really interested in the Beijing Games, they're already thinking further ahead. Some, like those representing the cities of Sochi, Salzburg and Pyeongchang, were more interested in who would be awarded the Winter Games in 2014. Other cities and boroughs were there bidding to be awarded training camps during the London Olympics in 2012. Sports tourism is a massive industry and cities are happy to shell out to lure a big occasion.
However, SportAccord underlined the main challenge facing the IOC and the government in Beijing will be to deal with wider issues around the games, because signs are that politics and sport will go head-to-head to be the biggest story of them all.
