Looking at the 2024 Logos

Wednesday was an important day in the 2024 Olympic bid race.  It was the day that the first bid books (which are the first real detailed documents discussing the city's plans) were due to the IOC.  All four cities submitted their documents in time, but three of them went a step beyond.  LA, Paris and Rome all revealed their official bid logos.  Still nothing from Budapest, but they've successfully squashed any attempts at a public referendum (which killed Hamburg's bid) so far, so it looks like they'll stay in the race until the vote.

We've learned a lot about the other three contenders and their vision for the Olympics, though.  Paris and Rome plan on using their iconic landmarks to provide the breathtaking backdrop of the Games, while any sporting venue you can think of in Southern California is included in LA's plan (but, interestingly, NOT the Rams' new stadium).

And the three logos that were released were all pretty cool, too.  Rome's is a stylized version of the Colosseum in the colors of the Italian flag.  Paris made the Eiffel Tower into a 24 (a company has claimed plagiarism because of the similarity to its logo, but unlike the Tokyo 2020 logo and that Belgian theater, there's enough of a difference here that I think it's OK).  The last to reveal its logo was Los Angeles, the City of Angels.  Naturally, the logo is an angel.  She's going towards the sun.

Why is the fact that the angel is going towards the sun significant?  Because the three cities revealed their bid slogans along with their logos, and LA's is "Follow the sun."  Paris, which had the incredibly stupid "Oui Paris" slogan when it lost to London for 2012, is going with the much better "The strength of a dream."  Rome has the worst slogan of the three--"The Italian art of the welcome."  Budapest, again, I don't know.  I'm sure we'll find out more details soon.

As for the three bidders that we do know stuff about, let's take a look...

LOS ANGELES

LA's bid includes mainly existing venues, some of which were used during the 1984 Games.  Some of them are fairly obvious (the LA Coliseum for Ceremonies and track & field, Staples Center for basketball, the Rose Bowl for soccer), while some seem kind of odd (swimming, diving and synchronized swimming at the new MLS stadium being built for LAFC, for example).  Their big one was beach volleyball in Santa Monica.  Sydney and Rio put beach volleyball on two of the most famous actual beaches in the entire world, while London gave us that ridiculously awesome temporary venue behind Horse Guards Parade with the London Eye in the background).  Beach volleyball as we know it was invented in Santa Monica in the 1940s.  It seems like the natural choice.

PARIS

I still view the Paris bid as the favorite.  They were viewed as the favorite for 2012 until London won in the final round of voting, and 2024 will be the 100th anniversary of the last time Paris hosted the Olympics.  On paper, this bid is better than the one for 2012.  Paris is taking the London approach to beach volleyball.  At the foot of the Eiffel Tower.  With 95 percent of the venues already existing or temporary, Paris is taking a very similar approach to LA in that regard (and that may be the wave of the future with Olympic bids).  And why not?  Because Paris has plenty of world-class venues that regularly host major events (the Stade de France, Roland Garros, the Champs Elysees), as well as a ton of great places to put temporary venues (not just beach volleyball at the Eiffel Tower, but equestrian at the Palace of Versailles, too).

ROME

Just like Paris, Rome has plenty of historic venues that they can use as an Olympic backdrop.  And they plan to use just about all of them.  The marathon finishing under the Arch of Constantine, which immediately brings to mind the image of a barefoot Abebe Bikila in 1960.  They'd also use the same Olympic Stadium from 1960 (and presumably not rebuild a brand new one on top of it like Tokyo's doing).  Beach volleyball?  How about the Circus Maximus?  And how cool would those medals ceremonies at the Colosseum be?  Rome's only proposed new permanent competition venues are the velodrome and a multi-sport venue, which is probably for what I call the "convention center" sports (several smaller sports are held at the same venue in every Olympics).

If I were picking a winner based solely on the bid books released today, I'd put Paris and Los Angeles in front, with Rome just a touch behind.  But there's still a long way to go.  They won't pick a winner for another 18 months.  A lot can happen between now and then.  What we do know, though, is that the 2024 Olympics will be pretty spectacular.  Wherever they end up being held.