By Celina Yin

This year’s Summer Olympics are held in Tokyo. But how did Tokyo become the host in the first place? Tokyo was going to host the Olympics in 2020, but because of Covid, the event was postponed. Tokyo hosted the Olympics for the first time in 1964, so they are used to how it works.

Back in 2013, Tokyo was already chosen for the 2020 Olympics! Usually cities are chosen to host the Olympics seven years before. The process of choosing a city to host the Olympics is very competitive. Major cities from all around the world come to make bids to the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which is the group that chooses which city should host the Olympics in seven years.

Bids are plans about why the city wants to host the event and how they are planning to run it. The bid also includes things like transportation, security, and more. A candidate city has to be able to hold all the athletes, fans, and journalists. Each city goes through an inspection by the IOC to make sure the city can host the event. The inspections take 10 months! If the city has passed the inspection, it will be considered a candidate city. In 2013, the candidate cities were Istanbul (Turkey), Tokyo (Japan), Madrid (Spain), Baku (Azerbaijan) and Doha (Qatar). Istanbul, Tokyo and Madrid were chosen as the top three candidates. After the cities have presented their bids and paid the $150,000 fee, the IOC selects the winning city. After that, the winning city builds athletic buildings so that the Olympic athletes can compete.

Now, athletes from all over the world compete in all kinds of different events, in the Olympics at Tokyo.

SOURCES:

https://www.cbc.ca/kidsnews/post/how-did-tokyo-become-the-host-of-the-olympics

https://olympics.com/ioc/news/ioc-selects-three-cities-as-candidates-for-the-2020-olympic-games