Table of contents

1. Introduction essey 2. Olympic Games

Ancient Olympics Modern Olympics Youth Games

3. Olympic Games in London 3.1. Symbols

The Olympic Flag The Olympic motto

3.2. Ceremonies
Opening Closing Medal presentation

3.3. Sports 3.4. Controversies

3.5. Environmental policy

Boycotts Venues and infrastructure Public transport Financing Ticketing Countdown Logo Security Mascots Medals Torch relay Opening ceremony

4. Bibliography 5. Conclusion 1. Introduction essey

The Olympic Games are a major international featuring summer and winter sports, in which thousands of athletes participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games have come to be regarded as the worlds most important sports competition where more than 200 nations participate. Originally, the ancient Olympic Games were held in Olympia, Greece, from the 8th century BC to the 4th century AD. Because of this, I believe that the Olympic Games are a very interesting and educational subject. You may find out things about sports and also about history. I was also interested to find out a lot of information about the organization of such an event in London. I wonder how they will cope with such an affluence of people. The host city is responsible for organizing and funding the celebration of the Games. The celebration of the Games includes many rituals and symbols, such as the Olympic flag and torch, as well as the opening and closing ceremonies. The first, second and third place finishers in each event receive Olympic medals: gold, silver an bronze. The 2012 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the London 2012 Olympic Games, are scheduled to take place in London, England, United Kingdom from 27 July to 12 Auugust 2012. London will become the first city to officially host the modern Olympic Games three times, having previously done so in 1908 and in 1948. Im curious to see what improvements to the organization will be made and how the contest will be held this year in comparison to the previous ones that were held in London. It will also be interesting to see the differences in organization this time compared with the other countries.

2. Olympic Games
The Olympic Games are a major international event featuring summer and winter sports, in which thousands of athletes participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games have come to be regarded as the worlds most important sports competition where more than 200 nations participate. The Games are currently held every two years, with Summer and Winter Olympic Games alternating, although they occur every four years within their respective seasonal games. Originally, the ancient Olympic Games were held in Olympia, Greece, from the 8th century BC to the 4th century AD. The evolution of the Olympic Movement during the 20th and 21st centuries has resulted in several changes to the Olympic Games. Some of these adjustments include the creation of the Winter Games for ice and winter sports, the Paralympic Games for athletes with a physical disability, and the Youth Olympic Games for teenage athletes. The growing importance of the mass media created the issue of corporate sponsorship and commercialization of the Games. The host city is responsible for organizing and funding a celebration of the Games. The celebration of the Games encompasses many rituals and symbols, such as the Olympic flag and torch, as well as the opening and closing ceremonies. Over 13,000 athletes compete at the Summer and Winter Olympics in 33 different sports and nearly 400 events. The first, second, and third place finishers in each event receive Olympic medals; gold, silver, and bronze, respectively.

Ancient Olympics
The Ancient Olympic Games were a series of competitions held between representatives of several city-states and kingdoms from Ancient Greece, which featured mainly athletic but also combat and chariot racing events. One of the most popular myths identifies Heracles and his father Zeus as the progenitors of the Games. According to legend, it was Heracles who first called the Games "Olympic" and established the custom of holding them every four years.

Modern Games
The first significant attempt to emulate the ancient Olympic Games was the L'Olympiade de la Rpublique, a national Olympic festival held annually from 1796 to 1798 in Revolutionary France. The competition included several disciplines from the ancient Greek Olympics. Between 1862 and 1867, Liverpool held an annual Grand Olympic Festival. The programme for Athens 1896 had similarities to that of the Liverpool Olympics. In 1865 Hulley, Dr. Brookes and E.G. Ravenstein founded the National Olympian Association in Liverpool, a forerunner of the British Olympic Association. Its articles of foundation provided the framework for the International Olympic Charter. In 1866, a national Olympic Games in Great Britain was organized at London's Crystal Palace.

Youth Games
In 2010, the Olympic Games were complemented by the Youth Games, which gives athletes between the ages of 14 and 18 the chance to compete. The first Summer Youth Games were held in Singapore from 1426 August 2010, while the inaugural Winter Games will be hosted in Innsbruck, Austria, two years later. These Games will be shorter than the senior Games; the summer version will last twelve days, while the winter version will last nine days. 3,500 athletes and 875 officials are allowed to participate at the Summer Youth Games, and 970 athletes and 580 officials at the Winter Youth Games. The sports to be contested will coincide with those scheduled for the senior Games. French and English are the official languages of the Olympic Movement. The other language used at each Olympic Games is the language of the host country. Every proclamation (such as the announcement of each country during the parade of nations in the opening ceremony) is spoken in these three languages, or the main two depending on whether the host country is an English or French speaking country.

3. Olympic Games in London

3.1 Symbols

The Olympic flag

The Olympic Movement uses symbols to represent the ideals embodied in the Olympic Charter. The Olympic symbol, better known as the Olympic rings, consists of five intertwined rings and represents the unity of the five inhabited continents (America, Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe). The colored version of the ringsblue, yellow, black, green, and redover a white field forms the Olympic flag. These colors were chosen because every nation had at least one of them on its national flag. The flag was adopted in 1914 but flown for the first time only at the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp, Belgium.

The Olympic flag

The Olympic motto

The Olympic motto is Citius, Altius, Fortius, a Latin expression meaning "Faster, Higher, Stronger". Coubertin's ideals are further expressed in the Olympic creed: The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well.

3.2 Ceremonies
Opening

The ceremony typically starts with the hoisting of the host country's flag and a performance of its national anthem. The host nation then presents artistic displays of music, singing, dance, and theater representative of its culture. The artistic presentations have grown in scale and complexity as successive hosts attempt to provide a ceremony that outlasts its predecessor's in terms of memorability. After the artistic portion of the ceremony, the athletes parade into the stadium grouped by nation. Greece is traditionally the first nation to enter in order to honor the origins of the Olympics. Nations then enter the stadium alphabetically according to the host country's chosen language, with the host country's athletes being the last to enter. Speeches are given, formally opening the Games. Finally, the Olympic torch is brought into the stadium and passed on until it reaches the final torch carrieroften a well-known and successful Olympic athlete from the host nationwho lights the Olympic flame in the stadium's cauldron.

Closing
The closing ceremony of the Olympic Games takes place after all sporting events have concluded. Flag-bearers from each participating country enter the stadium, followed by the athletes who enter together, without any national distinction. Three national flags are hoisted while the corresponding national anthems are played: the flag of Greece, to honor the birthplace of the Olympic Games; the flag of the current host country, and the flag of the country hosting the next Summer or Winter Olympic Games. After these compulsory elements, the next host nation briefly introduces itself with artistic displays of dance and theater representative of its culture.

Athletes gather in the stadium during the closing ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics

Medal presentation

A medal ceremony during the 2008 Summer Olympics

A medal ceremony is held after each Olympic event is concluded. The winner, second and third-place competitors or teams stand on top of a three-tiered rostrum to be awarded their respective medals. After the medals are given out, the national flags of the three medalists are raised while the national anthem of the gold medalist's country plays. For every Olympic event, the respective medal ceremony is held, at most, one day after the event's final.

3.3 Sports
The Olympic Games program consists of 35 sports, 30 disciplines and nearly 400 events. For example, wrestling is a Summer Olympic sport, comprising two disciplines: Greco-Roman and Freestyle. It is further broken down into fourteen events for men and four events for women, each representing a different weight class. The Summer Olympics program includes 26 sports, while the Winter Olympics program features 15 sports. Athletics, swimming, fencing, and artistic gymnastics are the only summer sports that have never been absent from the Olympic program. Cross-country skiing, figure skating, ice hockey, Nordic combined, ski jumping, and speed skating have been featured at every Winter Olympics program since its inception in 1924. Current Olympic sports, like badminton, basketball, and volleyball, first appeared on the program as demonstration sports, and were later promoted to full Olympic sports. Some sports that were featured in earlier Games were later dropped from the program. The 2012 program will feature just 26 sports. The 2016 and 2020 Games will return to the maximum of 28 sports given the addition of rugby and golf.

3.4 Controversies
Boycotts

Map showing the countries that boycotted the 1976 (yellow), 1980 (blue) and 1984 (red) Summer Olympics.
Australia, Great Britain and Switzerland are the only countries to send a team to every Olympic Games since their inception in 1896. Most countries miss an Olympics due to a lack of qualified athletes, but some choose to boycott a celebration of the Games for several different reasons. The Olympic Council of Ireland boycotted the 1936 Berlin Games. The 2012 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the Games of the XXX Olympiad or "London 2012 Olympic Games", are scheduled to take place in London, England, United Kingdom from 27 July to 12 August 2012. London will become the first city to officially host the modern Olympic Games three times, having previously done so in 1908 and in 1948. The Olympics prompted a redevelopment of many of the areas of London in which the games are to be held particularly themed towards sustainability. While the budgetary considerations have generated some criticism, the Games will make use of many venues which were already in place before the bid, including Wembley Stadium, Wembley Arena, Wimbledon All England Club, Lord's Cricket Ground, The O2 Arena, Earls Court Exhibition Centre, Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy, and the Excel Centre. On 6 July 2005, the final selection was announced at the Raffles City Convention Centre in Singapore. Here Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Tony Blair was the only leader of the five candidate cities' countries to make a personal lobby (he had also been the only one to attend the 2004 Olympics). Moscow was the first city to be eliminated, followed by New York and Madrid. The final two cities left in contention were London and Paris. At the end of the fourth round of voting, London won the right to host the 2012 Games with 54 votes, defeating Paris's 50.

Venues and infrastructure

Olympic Stadium in June 2011

The 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games will use a mixture of new venues, existing and historic facilities, and temporary facilities, some of them in well-known locations such as Hyde Park and Horse Guards Parade. Some of the new facilities will be reused in their Olympic form, while others, will be resized or relocated. The majority of venues have been divided into three zones within Greater London: the Olympic Zone, the River Zone and the Central Zone. In addition to these are those venues that, by necessity, are outside the boundaries of Greater London. The football tournament will be staged at several grounds around the UK. Work began on the Park in December 2006 when a sports hall in Eton Manor was pulled down. The athletes' village in Portland was completed in September 2011. In November 2004 the 500 acre Olympic Park plans were revealed. The redevelopment of the area to build the Olympic Park required compulsory purchase orders of property.

Public transport

The Olympic Javelin service

London's public transport was an element of the bid which was scored poorly in the IOC's initial evaluation; however, they felt that if the improvements were delivered in time for the Games then London would cope. Transport for London carried out numerous

improvements in preparation for 2012, including the expansion of the London Overground's East London Line, upgrades to the Docklands Light Railway and the North London Line, and the introduction of a new "Javelin" high-speed rail service, using the Hitachi Corporation's "bullet" trains. According to network rail an additional 4,000 train services will run during the Games, with train operators putting on longer trains during the day. Transport for London also propose the construction of a 25 million cable car across the River Thames, the "Thames Gateway Cable Car", to link 2012 Olympics venues. It will cross the Thames river between Greenwich Peninsula and the Royal Docks, carrying up to 2,500 passengers an hour at a heights above 50 meters in the air. It is designed to cut journey times between the O2 arena and the Excel exhibition centre both of which are Olympic locations. The privately funded system could provide a crossing every 30 seconds. The plan is to have 80% of athletes travel less than 20 minutes to their event and to have 93% of athletes within 30 minutes of their event. The Olympic Park would be served by ten separate railway lines with a combined capacity of 240,000 passengers per hour.

A London Underground train decorated to promote London's Olympic bid this coincided with plans for investment in the city's public transport network.

Financing
The costs of mounting the Games are separate from those for building the venues and infrastructure, and redeveloping the land for the Olympic Park. While the Games are privately funded, the venues and Park costs are met largely by public money. On 15 March 2007, Tessa Jowell announced to the House of Commons a budget of 5.3 billion to cover building the venues and infrastructure for the Games. On top of this, she announced various other costs including an overall additional contingency fund of 2.7 billion, security and policing costs of 600 million. According to these figures, the total

for the Games and the regeneration of the East London area, is 9.345 billion. To help fund the cost of staging the games the London Olympic organisers have agreed partnership deals with major companies.

Ticketing
Organisers estimate that some 8 million tickets would be available for the Olympic Games, and 1.5 million tickets for the Paralympic Games. Ticket sign-up, in Great Britain, was launched on 22 March 2010 and the application website was opened on 15 March 2011 until 26 April 2011. Ticket prices range from 20 for many events to 2,012 for the most expensive seats at the opening ceremony. For the first time in Olympic history the sailing events will be ticketed. The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) have admitted that further tickets, up to one million, will be released later in 2011 for events that have failed to sell out in the initial allocation. Over half the people who applied got no tickets in Great Britain. The second round of ticket sales took place over a 10 day period between the 23 June and 3 July 2011, with priority given to those who were unsuccessful in the first allocation process. At this point there were about 1.7 million tickets for football and 600,000 for other sports, including archery, hockey, football, judo, boxing and volleyball, among other sports with 1.5 million tickets priced between 20 and 50. Unfortunately due to the amount of people buying tickets and because the ticketmaster website did not update immediately, 15,000 had their application rejected, but 90% of people did get some tickets. People who were successful in the first round of tickets were allowed to buy more during the period 817 July 2011. By this point 1.5 million tickets were available for football, 40,000 for Volleyball and 8,000 for freestyle wrestling on a first come first served basis. However by 10 July all the tickets for Volleyball had been sold, as 3.5 million tickets had been sold in total. Another round of tickets was promised to go on sale in 2012. To reduce traffic, ticket holders will be entitled to free use of London's public transportation network on the day of the event.

Countdown

Countdown clock in Trafalgar Square

A digital clock, located in Trafalgar Square, commenced a countdown to the opening ceremony on 14 March 2011. However, less than 24 hours after it was switched on, it suffered a technical failure, and stoppeddisplaying "500 (days) 7 (hours) 06 (minutes) 56 (seconds)." It was quickly repaired.

Logo
There have been two London 2012 logos: one for the bidding process created by Kino Design and a second as the brand for the Games themselves. The former is a ribbon with blue, yellow, black, green, and red stripes winding through the text "LONDON 2012," making the shape of the River Thames in East London. The latter, designed by Wolff Olins, was unveiled on 4 June 2007 and cost 400,000. This new logo is a representation of the number 2012, with the Olympic Rings embedded within the zero.

Security
The British government announced in December 2011 that 13,500 members of the armed forces will be in place for the Olympic games, as well as 10,000 police (who will lead the security of the Games). Naval and air assets, including ships situated in the Thames will also be deployed as part of the security operation. The cost of security has also increased from 282 million to 553 million pounds sterling. This will be the biggest security operation Britain has faced for decades.

Mascots

Wenlock and Mandeville

The official mascots for the 2012 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games were unveiled on 19 May 2010; this marks the second time (after Vancouver) that both Olympic and Paralympic mascots were unveiled at the same time. Wenlock and Mandeville are animations depicting two drops of steel from a steelworks in Bolton. They are named Wenlock, after the Shropshire town of Much Wenlock, which held a forerunner of the current Olympic Games, and Mandeville, after Stoke Mandeville, a village in Buckinghamshire where a forerunner to the Paralympic Games were first held.

Medals
In December 2010, it was announced that the Royal Mint would produce the medals for the Olympic and Paralympic Games. The Royal Mint expected to produce around 4,700 medals for the games. The medals are 7mm thick and weigh between 375-400g. They are designed by David Watkins. Each medal will have the sport and the discipline engraved on the rim. Like the last few Olympic medal designs the front will once again have Greek goddess of victory, Nike, stepping from Parthenon. The reverse side has the Games logo, and a ribbon depicting the River Thames with a grid symbolising pulling together and radiating energy. The medals will have a purple ribbon attached to them which symbolises Royalty and protocol.

Torch

relay

The Olympics torch relay will be run from 19 May 27 July 2012, prior to the games. Plans for the relay have been further developed in 20102011, with the torch bearer selection process announced on 18 May 2011. The torch relay will arrive on 18 May 2012 from Greece. The relay will last 70 days, with 66 evening celebrations, six Island Visits with about 8,000 people carrying the torch 300 m (330 yd) each, starting from Land's End in Cornwall.

Opening ceremony
The Opening ceremony of 2012 Summer Olympics will be called 'The Isles of Wonder. Oscar Winning director Danny Boyle will be the artistic director for the spectacular opening ceremony. It was confirmed in February 2012 that Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh will officially open the games at the opening ceremony.

3.5. Environmental policy

The Olympic Park will incorporate 45 hectares of wildlife habitat, with a total of 525 bird boxes, and 150 bat boxes. Local waterways and riverbanks are to be enhanced as part of the process. Renewable energy will also feature at the Olympics. It was originally planned to provide 20% of the energy for the Olympic Park and Village from renewable technologies; however, this may now be as little as 9%. Proposals to meet the original target included largescale on-site wind turbines and hydroelectric generators in the River Thames. However, these plans were scrapped for safety reasons. The focus has since moved to installing solar panels on some buildings, and providing the opportunity to recover energy from waste.

5. Conclusion
The Olympic Games are a major event and have come to be regarded as the worlds most important sports competition. The Cultural Olympiad comprises many programs with over 500 events spread over four years over the whole of the United Kingdom, and culminating in the London 2012 Festival. All the competitions will be televised, thereby promoting London. Also, many tourists will take part in the performance. Due to this important sport competition, London made a lot of improvements to public transport and built stadiums for the competitions. For example, a new initiative to bring tourists and visitors into the area involves a public waterbus "hop-on hop-off" route. The 2012 London Olympics provides also an excellent hook to engage students all round the world in learning about Britain.

4. Bibliography
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Summer_Olympics http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympic_Games http://www.theimport.co.uk/2010/05/london-2012-olympic-mascots/ http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=11327&l=1 http://www.luxurylaunches.com/other_stuff/the_london_olympic_torch_wins_d esign_of_the_year_award_2012.php http://www.globaltimes.cn/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20%20NewsArticles/Print.aspx? tabid=99&tabmoduleid=94&articleId=705576&moduleId=405&PortalID=0 http://www.london-attractions.info/olympic-stadium.htm http://theflagman.co.uk/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=200