The Olympic Rehearsal

"2008.sina.com.cn
By Li Ai

On 19th Apr 2008, The International Athletes Federation’s Walkathon Competition will be held at the National Stadium aka Bird Nest. This will be the FIRST international event ever to use the stadium. Yesterday, the Beijing Olympic Committee announced at its website the schedule for the series of competitions collectively known as “Good Luck Beijing 2008”. This is the series of events that will test all the Olympic venues in areas of infrastructure, service system process and competition organization process.

“Good Luck Beijing 2008” is the rehearsal and practice for the stadiums ahead of the Olympics. It begins on 1st Aug 2007 and will progress through all the stadiums. As the main venue for the games, the National Stadium (Bird Nest) is estimated to be completed by end of 2007. It will be revealed before the World on 19th April 2008 as the Walkathon begins. The National Aquatic Center will also be put into use for the first time in Feb 2008.

According to the Beijing Olympics Committee correspondent, starting from the second half of 2007, all venues will be hosting events to verify and validate their infrastructure and competition management process as part of the rehearsal for the Beijing Olympics. "

To think that 4 years ago in Greece, they were still doing the landscaping when the games started.