The Olympic Stadium in Seville on the night of its inauguration, 5 May 1999 (© Getty Images)
It may have come down to a desperate sprint in the end but Seville is ready for the 7th edition of the IAAF World Championships.
From the magnificent new stadium to the Palacio de Exposicions y Congresos, to all the other venues used by the IAAF Family for the Congress and the Championships, only the final finishing touches need to be made – in the words of the city’s Mayor Alfredo Sanchez Monteseirin – "it’s a question of hanging the curtains and choosing the potted plants, just like in any new house."
The task has not been easy, and those organisers with offices in the stadium have had their nerves tweaked as the construction team raced to meet the deadline. But, especially over the last week, the stadium has been transformed from a noisy building site to a venue suitable for the third most important sporting event on the planet. It is ready for the technical staff and Media, for the athletes and for the spectators, who we all hope will fill its seats from August 20 –29.
But how is the event perceived in this vibrant city – capital of a region rightly perceived as the soul of Spain?
For anyone with a television or a newspaper it would be impossible not to know that the event is taking place.
The country’s media outlets have been bombarded by facts and figures about the logistics.
Did you know that 4000 security personnel will be on duty during the championships?
Or that in the event of an emergency, the building can be emptied in five minutes? Or that the imaginative stage being built for the Opening Ceremony will need to be knocked down by 250 workers the moment the show ends so that the field event athletes can perform themselves a few hours later?
Still on the topic of the Opening Ceremony –many may already know the flamenco star Joaquin Cortez but who was aware that the special effects were designed by a man who worked on the last James Bond film?
It would also be difficult to miss the publicity banners hanging alongside the busiest streets of Seville. Adidas, an IAAF official sponsor, win top marks for their imaginative efforts at transforming the likes of Reyes Estevez, Denise Lewis, Haile Gebrselassie and Ato Boldon (you can’t win them all) into god-like figures – evoking elemental forces and classical mythology. With queues now evident at the main ticket booths in the city, the paying public too seems to be waking up to what will soon take place in their city.
In the next few days close to 10,000 strangers, from over 200 countries and territories, will transform Seville into the sporting capital of the world. The route has been long – and hard – but as we all know, Spain has marathon runners who can sprint too, and they have triumphed again.
