15 facts about Rio 2016 Olympics
With less than 40 days to go until the Opening Ceremony for Rio 2016 Olympics, last minute preparations are in full swing around the country.
Multi award-winning developer, Ritz-G5, based in Brazil’s “City of the Sun” Natal offers to take a moment and read 15 interesting facts about Rio 2016 Olympics.
Here are Ritz-G5’s 15 interesting facts about the upcoming Olympic Games 2016 in Rio de Janeiro:
- Rio 2016 will be the first time in Olympic history that a South American country has hosted the Games. Rio de Janeiro has won its bid in 2009.
- The Olympic torch relay which began in April, will travel across Brazil for more than 90 days, finishing in Rio on August 5.
- Rio 2016 Olympics will be attended by 10,000+ athletes from 206 countries.
- The athletes will be competing in 306 sporting events for 4,924 medals in 17 days.
- Rugby sevens will make its debut at Rio 2016 and golf will return to the Olympics after a 112-year absence. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided to reinstate the sport, which was previously played in the 1900 and 1904 games.
- The opening and closing ceremonies will be held in the legendary Maracana stadium, which currently holds the world record for the most fans ever to attend a football game. Current capacity of the stadium is around 78,000.
- The games will take place in four different areas: Copacabana, famous for its beach will host beach volleyball; Barra, home to the Olympic Park; Deodoro will host aquatics, BMX and equestrian centres and Maracana, which features two large stadiums.
- The projected cost of the Rio Olympics is 39.1 billion Brazilian real (US $11.5 billion) as according to the Public Olympic Authority of Brazil.
- More than 3.6 billion global viewers are expected to watch Rio 2016 on TV.
- Rio 2016 Olympics will be the first to feature Olympians born in 2000. The rules state that all competitors must have been born before Jan 1, 2003 but many sports have different age requirements for health and safety reasons.
- The mascot for this year’s Olympics is “Vinicius” a yellow and blue creature which represents Brazilian wildlife.
- 5 million tickets went on sale, with prices ranging between US $40 and $3,000 for the best seats at the opening ceremony. So far, the most popular events are football, basketball, volleyball and handball.
- Organisers are looking to prepare around 6,000 meals per day to feed the athletes. Brazilian staple dishes such as rice, black beans and barbecued meat will be accompanied by other local foods such as tapioca, pao de gueijo (cheese bread) and acai (Amazonian fruit).
- Rio 2016 will require around 70,000 volunteers. 50,000 volunteers have already been selected in February and most come from Brazil. USA, UK, Russia and China comprise most of the other volunteers chosen so far.
- Rio’s taxi drivers are being given the chance to sign up for free online English lessons offered by the Rio 2016 Organizing Committee.
For more information on Rio 2016 Olympics, please contact the team on +44 207 183 7565 or visit www.ritz-g5.com.