Dec 12, 2008
In 2012, over 1,000 athletes aged 14 to18, will compete in the first Winter Youth Olympic Games. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) today announced Innsbruck, Austria as the Host City of these inaugural Games.
The Winter Youth Olympic Games are a 10-day multi-sport, cultural and educational event for young people. The sport programs may vary from one Youth Olympic Games (YOG) to the next because the IOC has established that new venues will not be built for these Games. The selection of sports will be determined partly on the basis of venue availability, but will include many of the sports seen in the Olympic Winter Games. Another consideration is that the YOG sports are carefully chosen to protect the health and safety of the young high-performance athletes.
For aspiring young winter sport Olympians, the YOG are a rare chance to participate in an international multi-sport atmosphere. For Laura Glover, a 15-year-old luge athlete in Calgary, the YOG may be her chance to iron out some uncertainties that may come with her first Olympic Winter Games. Glover, a member of the Canadian junior national luge team, hopes to be a forerunner in 2010 Winter Games, but says the YOG would be another huge opportunity to mature as an athlete. She will be 18 at the time of the 2012 YOG. If her sport is part of the program, she says she will certainly push to take part.
Laura Glover in her luge suit
“I think that basically anything to do with the Olympic Games is obviously a dream,” said Glover. “I also remember hearing things from other athletes saying their first Games were so scary because they didn’t know what to expect, so I think this [YOG] would be good because you would kind of already know what to expect of that experience of competing with other athletes.”
Right now Glover only trains with two other girls her age, and she hasn’t yet had an opportunity to participate in a multi-sport event. Aside from a few junior World Cup luge races last year, she says she hasn’t met many athletes from other countries.
A major rationale for the YOG is to educate developing athletes about critical topics in sport such as the dangers of doping and violence, the risks associated with overtraining and under training, and the importance of good nutrition and a healthy life balance.
“Alongside competition itself, it [the YOG] can offer an excellent platform to create a true community between the youth of the world and the participants, by learning and sharing experiences,” Jacques Rogge, IOC President stated in the IOC’s report about the Winter YOG.
Teaching Olympic ideals
The YOG mirrors Olympic Games ideals and allows young athletes and participating National Olympic Committees (NOCs) to have representatives in educational workshops and cultural programs at the Games. Educational interactive workshops and forums on Olympic values, healthy lifestyles and anti-doping will help prepare participants for a career in sport. The workshops will be hosted by well-known sportsmen and women, international experts and global personalities in education, culture and sport, who will bring a higher awareness of the issues and adversities facing today’s athletes.
As with the Summer and Winter Olympic Games, the Summer and Winter YOG will be staggered in two-year intervals, with each Games occurring every four years. The first Summer YOG will be held in 2010 in Singapore. The role of the IOC, International Sport Federations (IFs) and NOCs will be the same as for the Olympic Games. The IOC organizes the bid process, and its members select the Host City based on an evaluation report produced by an Evaluation Commission. The IFs are in charge of the technical aspects of their individual sport and will also define age categories and qualification criteria. NOCs select and manage the delegation of their territory for the YOG.
The IOC already has a number of international youth outreach initiatives. One example is the Olympic Values Education Project (OVEP), which comprises a standardized tool kit and a database of educational projects carried out mostly in schools. The IOC also has a worldwide campaign to promote the Olympic values through various media channels and an enhanced website encouraging young people to share their sporting experiences.
YOG are a catalyst for excellence, friendship and respect, allowing young, aspiring Olympians to get a taste of the power of the world stage. It prepares young athletes for a healthy life of sport, and encourages the best in everyone.
To listen to the announcement, visit the IOC’s website.
© 2009 The Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games
Olympic and Paralympic Games photography © Getty Images, unless otherwise stated.