Friday, 19 October 2018 11:34

Truly the YOG of the New Era

The 3rd Summer Youth Olympic Games closed yesterday evening at the Youth Olympic Village in Buenos Aires, capping off 12 days of competition with 4,000 athletes and 8,000 volunteers and what IOC President Thomas Bach referred to as "truly the Youth Olympic Games of the new era."

Between 200,000 to 215,000 people attended the first Opening Ceremony of any Olympic Games to be held outside a stadium, in a city centre and open the public, the highest attendance in the modern history of the Olympic Games. Record attendance of the local population was also reached during the event, with 600,000 Youth Olympic Passes distributed and full crowds attending the men and women Combined finals of Sport Climbing.

"The mega trend in this world is that more and more people are moving into urban centres, so to reach these people, the sport has to go to the city centres," said Bach at the press conference preceding the Closing Ceremony.

The Youth Olympic Games featured an urban park concept, and competitions took place at multiple parks throughout the city of Buenos Aires. Sport Climbing, the only vertical sport on the programme, took place at the Urban Park where new sports competitions, street culture and new artistic expressions came together.

"The park concept, making the Games more urban, has been a massive success in Buenos Aires, bringing sport to the people. Sport nowadays is in competition with so many other options for leisure activities that we cannot only go to the stadiums and make the people (come) to us," said Bach.

Finally, the Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires was the first Olympic event with full gender equality. At the Sport Climbing event, 21 male and 21 female youth stars climbed for the sport's first Youth Olympic medals.

"These Youth Olympic Games were more urban, more female, more inclusive than any edition of any Olympic Games before. They were extremely innovative from the beginning to the end," said Bach.

Visit olympicchannel.com  to watch the Closing Ceremony, and links to all replays and recaps can be found on the Buenos Aires event page. For Bach's complete remarks at the press conference, please click here.

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