London has celebrated one year to go until the start of the 2012 Olympic Games, with myriad events taking place across the host city.
During a public ceremony in London’s Trafalgar Square, IOC President Jacques Rogge formally invited the world’s National Olympic Committees and their athletes to attend the 2012 Olympic Games, while the medals that athletes will strive to win next year were also unveiled for the first time.
Earlier, the one-year-to-go milestone had been marked by the completion of the Aquatics Centre – the sixth and final new venue to be built in the Olympic Park.
To celebrate its completion, Britain’s synchronised swimming team performed a routine in which they formed the number one, to signify the year-to-go countdown, while British Olympian Tom Daley also made the first dive into the Olympic pool.
Elsewhere, Omega unveiled a countdown clock in Greenwich, while Sebastian Coe, Chairman of the London 2012 Organising Committee (LOCOG), and former Olympic silver medallist Colin Jackson made plaster casts of their feet at London’s St Pancras Eurostar terminal to mark the “first steps” toward the Games.
IOC President Jacques Rogge said: “One year to go is a special time for any host nation. It is the moment when the International Olympic Committee invites the National Olympic Committees and their athletes to attend the Games, when Olympic dreams start to come into focus, and when the world turns its attention in earnest to the city that will welcome it in only 365 days’ time.
“London has come a long way since its election in 2005 in Singapore and the 2012 team and its partners are to be congratulated for their work. London 2012 is now ideally placed not just to deliver top level Olympic competition but also to leave a great legacy to the British people. I wish London well as it enters its final year of preparations and testing and I am confident that next summer this great city will once again do the Olympic movement proud.”
Coe added: “With a year to go we are inviting the athletes, spectators and visitors from around the world to come to the UK next summer – it’s ‘London Calling’. Waiting for them will be a spectacular festival of sport and culture in the world’s greatest city, which will be more magical and vibrant than ever. There is much to do in the next 12 months, but we can take huge comfort in the progress that has been made so far. We are absolutely on track and determined to stage Olympic and Paralympic Games which will deliver on the promises we made in Singapore, inspire the athletes and make the nation proud.”
