Our great city, widely credited with saving the modern Olympic movement in 1984, is rolling out the red carpet for USA Track & Field officials this week. The goal? To secure the 2016 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials, which will feature the nation’s top male and female endurance athletes and showcase our city’s enthusiasm for distance running.
Few Angelenos – at least those who have been around awhile – can forget the amazing success of the ’84 games, which brought the city together and created the financial model for Olympic Games ever since. The ’84 games were also the genesis of the Asics LA Marathon, now in its 29th year. City officials began planning the event in 1985, with the inaugural run taking place in 1986 – two short years after American Joan Benoit Samuelson’s historic victory in the first women’s marathon competition in the history of the Olympic Games.
Despite our city’s rich Olympic history and running culture, Los Angeles has never hosted the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials. Not only is Los Angeles extremely well-suited to host this event in 2016, but we are ready to show that our city can once again unite around the great Olympic movement.
The U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials would take place in March 2016, just months before the Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro. This timing could also coincide with our city’s bid to host the 2024 games. If the U.S. Olympic Committee were to select Los Angeles as the U.S. candidate, the marathon trials would be a showcase for a city and region that would be in the midst of an international campaign at that point; the 2024 host city will be selected by the International Olympic Committee in 2017.
While a bid for the games themselves might be further down the line, Los Angeles is now a finalist for the marathon trials, and local officials are making their best pitch. The Asics LA Marathon team is leading the bid effort along with the Los Angeles Sports Council, the Southern California Committee for the Olympic Games and many other civic, business and elected officials. The marathon has revamped itself in just a few short years to become one of the premier events on the distance-running circuit. A stunning new course that takes runners past a highlight reel of L.A.’s iconic sites as well as top-tier event management, operational excellence and a growing roster of elites have resulted in sold-out events and the kind of local buzz normally reserved for L.A.’s most popular sports teams.
Center of movement
Hosting the 2016 marathon trials, which would bring thousands of visitors to Los Angeles for many days of events and preparations, would mean an infusion of economic activity for hotels, restaurants and retailers, in addition to drawing attention from across the country.
It would also mean an opportunity to place Los Angeles at the center of the Olympic movement again, and to underscore the community benefits that continue to accrue more than three decades since the memorable closing ceremonies at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. The LA84 Foundation, which was endowed by surplus funds from the ’84 games, has committed more than $214 million to support youth sports programs for more than 3 million children throughout Southern California, and the organization continues to thrive.
When Track & Field officials meet with the city’s business and political elite this week, when they walk the streets that could determine our next Olympic men’s and women’s marathon teams, when they talk to ordinary Angelenos who are hungry for a return of Olympic glory, they just need to remember one thing: This is the city that launched the great success of the modern Olympics. We’re ready to build on that success to host a great Olympic Marathon Trials in 2016 – an event that could be a stepping stone to an Olympic return to Los Angeles in 2024.
Bob Graziano is chairman of the LA84 Foundation, Alan Rothenberg is chairman of the Los Angeles Sports Council and Barry Sanders is chairman of the Southern California Committee for the Olympic Games. All three are business and civic leaders in Los Angeles.
