2016 Olympics: Doing it the Brazilian way

Concerns continue about pollution in Guanabara Bay where the 2016 Olympic sailing events are to be held in Rio de Janeiro. This local problem has much history, with a valiant effort underway to leverage the Olympics in hopes to improve the situation.

Having followed this issue, Scuttlebutt has some observations:

♦ Sailing is a prominent sport in Rio. The area hosted the 2007 Pan American Games, 2010 Star World Championship, and 2013 Snipe World Championship, with many Olympic medalists and world champions coming from the region.
♦ Water pollution is not an exclusive problem to Guanabara Bay. Olympic sailors have seen it all in their travels.
♦ Sailors are accustomed to competing in an imperfect environment. People training at the venue are already adapting to the conditions.
♦ Moving the venue is unlikely as there has been too much invested at this point. Countries have already spent significant resources to prepare for the Games.
♦ Expect a late effort to address the pollution problem. This might not offer long term solutions but they will improve the venue for the Olympics.

Local activists, however, remain hopeful, and continue to pound the drum. A demonstration was staged this past Saturday (June 6) on Rio’s Botafogo Beach in the Guanabara Bay near where Olympic sailing events are to be held, where they unfurled a banner reading “One billion dollars and it’s still disgusting.”

An initial effort to clean up the bay, dating back more than 20 years, failed to make much of a dent in the problem, and as part of the city’s Olympic bid officials promised that a cleanup would be one of the games’ most enduring legacies. More than five years have passed since Rio was awarded the Games, but the situation remains largely the same.

Ricardo Prado, who heads the Sport Advisory Committee for Rio 2016, offers insight into the local culture. “I guess when we say yes, we don’t always really mean yes, which is a scary thing to say here. But I’m very confident we’re going to excel. We’re going to do it the Brazilian way, which hopefully will be a little more fun.”

Party on!