Friday, March 25, 2011

Volunteers for London Olympics 2012

How to become a volunteer for London 2012 Olympics?

If you really wish to be a part of the 2012 Olympic event in London, then you can enroll yourself in volunteer program to participate in London Olympic 2012 and Paralympics.  By involving yourself as a volunteer you can enjoy your favorite games as well as you can get closer to various sporting legends by helping them, and can be the part of thrill and excitement of London Olympics.  To make this event successful, London Olympic committee need around 70,000 volunteers.  Your background and community is no bar, also you need not have any previous experience. However, you must  have passion about volunteering and you must be at least 18 years old.

london olympics volunteersVolunteer jobs at the Olympics vary from directing people, crowd control, giving out basic information to game lovers.  They also need translators to help huge amount of foreign visitors.  You can find detailed information about the Olympics volunteer program on the official website of London Olympic 2012.  One thing you must keep in mind is that this job may not allow you to watch all the action.  For example, if your duty is on main gate controlling the crowds, then you can not enjoy the games.

There are two main recruiting authorities for the Olympic Games, one is Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) and other is London Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games (LOCOG).  If you are looking for a long term job at the Olympics, then ODA is the best for you.  Their task is not only developing the Olympic Game Park and village infrastructure but also making these facilities reusable after the games cease.  Hence there are a lots of contract and administration roles to make this event successful.

These organizing committees will train you as per their standard.  They expect minimum ten day’s volunteering commitment from you.  You have to attend at least three volunteer training sessions.  You should pass through security background check.  According to your skills, you will get a suitable role.  They have divided volunteers in two categories, specialist, and generalist.  Volunteers with previous experience and qualifications, such as medical or sport training will be qualified for specialist category.  On the other hand, generalist volunteers need no specific qualification and previous experience.  They may get their role in Olympic village operations, event service, and in uniform distribution.  To become a London Olympic 2012 volunteer, you can apply on their official website and add your name to the volunteering list.  With this, you will receive regular updates through email.

If you do not want to wait until the Olympic Games start, there are other ways to be involved in this event.  If you are a resident of East London living around the Olympic Games Park, you can involve in a volunteer program called ‘Changing Places’.  This program planned to help the local people to prepare their surroundings for the London Olympic Games.  This program will inspire peoples to modify public places like parks and motivate people to learn new skills.  They will also educate people to improve the local environment not only for the Olympic Games but even after the Olympics are over.  If you have any office-level skills, you can apply to become Trailblazer volunteer.  By this, you can help London Olympic 2012 committee by working for one day per week in their office for the Olympics and Paralympics games.

The volunteers will make the London Olympic Games happen.  So register your name at the official page for London 2012 Game Makers.

London is the Best choice for 2012 Olympics

London – the right place for Olympic Games 2012

London has successfully hosted two Summer Olympic Games in1908 and 1948, and the city boasts of one of the most expensive stadiums in the world.  In London, Games are not looked upon as a source of entertainment but they are a part of people’s lifestyle.  It is not surprising that London has been chosen to host the 2012 London Olympic Games.  Here are 10 reasons that make London the right place to host 2012 Olympics.

london olympic stadium1. London is the ideal host city for the 2012 Olympics.  The city has a rich sports culture.  With its love of sports and as a destination for many events before, we can say that London is not only preparing for the big event, but it is also a catalyst for the success of 2012 Olympics.

2. The Olympic Games would take place in a custom built Olympic Park of 500 acres, with a seating capacity of about 190,000 spectators.  Also, the Olympic Park has the most modern facilities and stadiums made in order to promote a healthy sports environment.

3. Protective measures are being taken to ensure that the games take place in a secure and safe environment.  They have hired many security agencies to offer players and spectators a safe sporting environment.

4. The Olympic Games Park has 6 different locations for basketball, Aquatic Centre, Football etc. The Olympic Park boasts of an interlinked network of walkways and footbridges designed so that visitors can easily access all the locations.

5. Transportation also gets due importance in order to ensure that all viewers can access game locations as quickly as possible, using public transport, by cycling or on foot.  New rail and bike paths have been added to the city’s transport network.  Even the elderly and disabled would be able to access the game venues easily using the newly designed public transport infrastructure.

6. The tickets for the 2012 London Olympics will allow free access to public transport facilities for London Olympics on the event days.  By promoting the use of public transport, London will not only offer a “green” way to access the Olympic venues, but it is also a practical solution for those who are not living in London.

7. Located very close to Olympics venue , the Olympic Village will provide accommodation to thousands of athletes and visitors.

8. During the Olympic Games in London, visitors will have easy access to hotel accommodation, with more than 100,000 rooms for selection.  Visitors can select from inexpensive options to luxurious accommodation.  Also accommodation for over 30,000 students would be made available at a low price.

9. The 2012 event is planned to be a green event.  It will aim to reduce carbon emissions, reduce waste with the use of recyclable materials and use water efficiently.

10. Another dimension of the Olympics event is that they are paying attention to broadcast the games live for citizens of many countries around the world.  To this end, the Main Press Center / International Broadcast Center would be built so that broadcasters like SPORTV, BBC, NBC can work in an efficient manner.

London Prepares for 2012 London Olympic Games

London getting ready for the 2012 Olympics

The London City has been preparing to host the 2012 Olympic Games.  London has been awarded this event since defeating their close rival, Paris.  London is the first city to host Olympic event three times.  In tough races to host this event, London beat New York, Moscow, Madrid and Paris in the last round on July 6th, 2005.  London is working very hard to make this event successful.

london olympicsThe London Summer Olympics 2012 are scheduled between July 27th and August 12th, 2012.  This event has 26 types of games to be played in 17 days at surprising 34 venues and this is the highlight of this event.  Thousands of visitors are expected in London during this event with its own local spectators.  Many new events have been added to Olympic 2012 with regular sports like Wrestling, Cycling, Swimming, Women’s Boxing, etc.  During this event most of game lovers will use public transportation system hence they are working hard to improve public transport system.

To attract more women spectators to these game special events are held.  The Olympic game venues are including some historic landmarks of London.  The Olympic event has one major controversy of financing.  A budget of £5.3 billion already announced for the game venue and structure building.  Further £1.7 billion arranged for reconstruction of the Lower Lea Valley.  Most of the games are held at this venue.  £2.7 billion are further arranged for various other expenses.  Organizers of the Olympic Games are concentrating on a project to avoid the Millennium Dome mistake.  They have planned downsizing venues for future use and some venues can be moved to a new location after the event.  Secondly rising controversy is about the logo.  Logo received poor response along with the amount of £400,000 spent on it.

Tickets and entry passes would be available from year 2011, but game lovers have started to keeping track of latest updates on ticketing schedule.  8 million tickets are estimated for Summer Olympics games and about 5 million tickets for the Paralympics.  For first time Women’s Boxing is included in this event.  On other hand softball and baseball are dropped out from the event.

London Olympics 2012 are exaggerated as the eco-friendly games.  London city’s water sources are being rejuvenated for the event and huge parkland is being developed.  City of London is visitor’s paradise offering a lot to visitors.  This Olympic will surely provide a wonderful atmosphere to get London’s multicultural peoples together by maintaining a friendly rivalry.  No doubt London city to be the best host for such a prime event.

If you want to watch breath taking action live by visiting the London, don’t depend on bogus agents or websites that assuring your booking for games.  If you are residents of U.K. then you can directly book your tickets from the London Olympic game’s official website.  If you are not residents of U.K. then you supposed to apply for tickets to your National Olympic Committee.  For fast and secure booking you can go through a prepaid card, debit card or credit card.  For updates keep checking the website of London Olympic 2010.

London Olympics 2012

It is a great news that Olympics 2012 would be held in London. England is getting this honor of hosting 2012 Olympics after a long time.

London is getting ready for this big event.  So many new hotels are coming up.  London Metro is also getting renovated with new routes added to take care of the surge in traffic.  Sportsmen from all over the world will participate in London Olympics 2012.  Tickes for Olympic games 2012 would be soon available for sale.  Hotels are also ready to accept bookings for the London Olympic games.

So are you planning to visit Olympic games 2012 in London?

Thursday, March 24, 2011

London 2012 Olympics: tickets guide

There are 6.6 million tickets available for sale across 645 sessions for the Olympics in this public ticket offer. Paralympic tickets will go on sale later in the year, so bookmark this Telegraph guide to work out which of the 645 sessions you wish to apply for and which category of seat you can afford.

How do I buy tickets?

You can apply for tickets from between March 15, 2011 to April 26, 2011. Because tickets are not sold on a first-come, first-served basis, the orders can be submitted at any stage during the 42-day period. There is no advantage in applying early.

So what do I do now?

Firstly you need to work out exactly what you want to order, taking into account your budget, the days you might like to focus on and preferred events. We have created a handy interactive tool where you can filter the complex ticketing schedule into days, venues and sports to help make the process easier.

So I have now worked out what I want to see, how do I apply?

You can apply for tickets from March 15 until midnight April 26, 2011. Because tickets are not sold on a first-come, first-served basis, the orders can be submitted at any stage during the 42-day period.

How do I submit my orders?

You can do this online at www.tickets.london2012.com or by filling in a paper form and posting it. Forms will be available from Lloyds TSB banks and through Bank of Scotland in Scotland, from March 15, 2011. In Northern Ireland, the forms will be available from public libraries.

How much will tickets cost?

Ticket prices are listed on the interactive schedule and range from £20 to £725. The top-of-the-range ticket price is £2,012 for a small number of the very best opening ceremony seats. There are also a small number of opening ceremony seats at a price of £20.12.

Do children pay the same prices?

At more than 220 lower-demand sessions the cost of the ticket is the same as the child’s age (up to age 16) on July 27, 2012. There are no free tickets, so a child aged six months will still need a ticket costing a pound. This £16 cap will also be offered to seniors aged 60 and over.

How do I pay?

Online payment is exclusively by VISA debit card, VISA credit card or a virtual prepaid card, which you must apply for beforehand. Paper forms can be paid for by cheque or postal order as well as VISA. Payments will be taken from the VISA accounts of successful applicants between May 10 and June 10.

But my VISA card expires between March 15 and July 31. What now?

This is tricky and annoying, but you may have to order using a prepaid card or by cheque as cards that expire before August won't be accepted by the system. Visa are working on bringing this date forward.

Is there a limit to how many tickets I can apply for?

Yes, each session has a ticket limit. This is shown on the the interactive schedule , the London Olympic website and on the paper order booklet. The most popular sessions, such as the opening ceremony, are limited to four tickets per order. Most sessions have a limit of six, but some sessions have a limit of 20.

What happens if the session I applied for is oversubscribed?

Organisers will conduct a ballot.

Can I have a second chance for my selected session at a different price point if it is oversubscribed?

Yes, you can indicate whether you want to be considered for higher, lower, or both higher and lower price categories, as well as the category being ordered, for every session for which you apply.

Will organisers conduct the ballots from the lowest prices first and move up, or ballot the highest prices first and move down?

Organisers say they have not decided which direction of priority will occur in the ballots at this stage, as they will assess the total number of applications before determining which is the best way.

So how do I maximise my chances of getting a ticket?

Another difficult question because the organisers won’t release details of the specific numbers of tickets available at the sessions, nor the breakdown of tickets available at various price points. So it is unclear which sessions have the most tickets available.

Some popular sessions at smaller venues will have few tickets available. For instance, the night velodrome sessions may have fewer than 3,000 available for the public.

Which tickets will be the most difficult to obtain?

Track cycling, swimming, gymnastics, beach volleyball and weightlifting will be highly sought after, mainly because these sports take place in smaller venues. The opening and closing ceremonies, along with the athletics finals, are also very popular.

Which tickets will be easiest?

Football tickets are cheap and there are a million of them. But the easiest way to see the Olympics is to plan to see the free events.

Free? At the Olympics?

Yes, you can line the routes of the race walks, marathons, road cycling and road cycling time-trial races for free.

Are there any other free events associated with the Olympics?

There will be a host of free “live” sites which will feature bands, big television screens, sponsor products and entertainment across London and the UK. Also look out for the torch relay route details to be announced later this year.

What is included in the ticket price?

As well as the Olympic session, the ticket you purchase includes VAT and also a Travelcard for travel in zones 1-9.

What are my chances of getting tickets in each price category?

Organisers say that each price band has approximately the same number of seats available. Two notable exceptions to this are the opening and closing ceremonies, where the bulk of tickets are in the middle price bands.

Can I return unwanted tickets?

Once you have applied for the tickets you want, you cannot then cherry pick which tickets to keep, and you will be charged for all of the tickets you have been successfully allocated. However, organisers will set up an online ticket exchange next year, where any unwanted tickets can be offered for sale (at face value) to other consumers.

Tickets must only be bought through the officially licensed means detailed here. To deter unauthorised vendors the fine for those convicted of illegally selling-on tickets has been quadrupled to £ 20,000.

Are the tickets available to people outside Britain?

Yes, the tickets and application process will be open to all of the European Union. People in the UK and designated European countries can apply through www.tickets.london2012.com

What if I live outside the EU?

Apply through the national Olympic committee in your home country.

Why aren’t all of the tickets for the Olympics on sale to the public?

The public application process will involve 6.6 million of the total 8.8 million tickets available.

Where have the other 25 per cent of tickets gone?

A chunk of the tickets are reserved for the broadcasters and media. Another large portion of tickets are given to the Olympic sponsors. IOC members and their spouses and invited guests, like heads of state and other politicians, have a special area too. All of the 33 London boroughs have had

access to a special lot to each buy 100 highly sought-after tickets, while the Mayor of London has 2,000 tickets and other government departments can access 9,000 tickets.

What happens if I don’t get the tickets I want?

You may be able to source the tickets from the official online ticket exchange when it is set up later in the year. You can also legally apply for tickets available to the national Olympic committees from other EU countries, however they only have a very small allocation and will be hard to obtain.

Organisers will possibly conduct further ballots, or have tickets released through the ticket exchange as they finalise venue arrangements and unblock seats being held back because of possible sight-line issues.

But surely I can get tickets elsewhere?

Other options are to buy official packages through three companies. The lowest-priced option, and one targeted at UK families, is through short-break holiday packages, including guaranteed seats, on sale through Thomas Cook from £99 to £6,499.

Prestige Ticketing is offering packages of tickets combined with top class hospitality with prices around £500 a head to lesser sports, going up to £5,400 for the most popular sports. However many of these tickets have to be purchased in blocks of 10. Jet Set Sports is packaging ultra high-end deals for overseas market.

More ticketing information is available at www.thomascooksport.com/London-2012-Games and www.tickets.london2012.com

London 2012 Olympics: daily countdown to the Games

As the London 2012 Olympics draws ever nearer Telegraph Sport counts down with a daily fact or figure.

London 2012 Olympics: daily countdown to the Games

Malfunction: the Olympic countdown clock stopped with 499 days to go Photo: EPA

10:14AM GMT 24 Mar 2011

491 - 491 bronze medals have been won in Olympic swimming events since 1896.

492 - In 492 BC, at the Ancient Games, a feared boxer named Cleomedes was denied a gold medal in a fight that involved him brutally slaying his opponent. The disqualification was not for the killing, but a technical incident during the fight.

493 - The 493 London bus runs from Richmond - a key destination in the road cycling race - via Wimbledon Park and Southfields, where the All England Tennis club is located.

494 - 494 competitors from 67 nations took place in swimming events at the Los Angeles 1984 Olympics.

495 - £495 is the estimated starting cost per head for a place in a corporate hospitality box at the London 2012 Olympics tennis events.

496 - £496 million is the estimated cost of the Olympic Stadium, the focus of a post-Games tussle between West Ham and Tottenham - which the former won.

497 - £497 million was the estimated returns to the Olympics Lottery Distribution Found from sales of dedicated games, as of March 2010,

498 - With 498 days to go we learned that fridges and large amounts of coins were banned from London 2012 Olympic venues.

499 - The London 2012 Olympic countdown clock in Trafalgar Square stopped with 499 days to go after a technical error. Designers Omega were forced into sending technicians to fix the issue in an incident that proved to be a public relations nightmare.

500 - £500 is the cost of buying two official London 2012 ‘yellow gold disc charms’ from the online store.

London 2012 Olympics: cash-strapped British Olympic Association pulls out of hosting pre-Games gathering

The general assembly of the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC), which is attended by officials from more than 200 countries and is one of the most important meetings on the Olympic calendar, was due to be hosted by the BOA in the capital in April 2012.

In recent years, whenever the biennial assembly has been held in the year of a summer Olympics it assembles in the Olympic host city three months before the Games, running alongside a meeting of the International Olympic Committee’s executive board. It was hosted by Beijing in 2008 and Athens in 2004.

Next year’s assembly had been earmarked for London but the BOA has confirmed that it has no choice but to back out of the event unless other ways can be found to meet the estimated £5 million cost.

Earlier this month, the BOA admitted it was facing such a serious cash crisis that it was struggling even to fulfil its core task of supporting the British team in 2012, in the run-up to the Olympics at its preparation camp, and during the Games.

The money saved from the ANOC meeting should help protect Team GB athletes from any funding shortfall. A BOA spokesman said: “It’s a function of prioritisation. It’s not lack of resources necessarily. We’ve got the resources. It’s just a matter of where you direct them and, given where we are, it’s our determination that those resources need to be directed to our core mission, which is delivery of the team and all the logistics and high-performance services around the team.

“Would we like to host ANOC? Absolutely we would. But given limited resources, we have to make prioritisations.”

The BOA has yet to withdraw formally from hosting the event but has informed ANOC of its difficulty in meeting its financial obligations. It will now be up to ANOC to decide whether to move the event elsewhere or to find alternative funding solutions to allow the assembly to go ahead in London.

It is understood that part of the problem is that the BOA has been left to pick up the entire £5 million bill for the assembly, unlike in Beijing and Athens where the Olympic organising committees contributed to the cost.

The decision to back out will be a further blow to the international reputation of the BOA, following its decision to mount a legal challenge at the Court of Arbitration for Sport to the way Locog calculates any cash surplus from the Games.

The BOA, which is entitled to 20 per cent of any profit, argues that the surplus should apply just to the Olympic budget, whereas Locog believes the cost of the Paralympics should be included in the calculation. The IOC has backed Locog’s stance after the BOA rejected an offer by IOC president, Jacques Rogge, to try to broker an amicable solution to the dispute.

Xavier Gonzalez, chief executive of the International Paralympic Committee, insisted on Friday that the Paralympics would cover its own costs and accused the BOA of undermining London’s vision of an integrated Olympic and Paralympic Games.

 
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