The "Bird's Nest" and the "Water Cube," two major competition venues for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games, will be unveiled in April and February 2008 respectively as they will host several "Good Luck Beijing" sports events at that time.

 

 

The National Stadium under construction

 

Among the 42 high-level sports events to be held ahead of the next summer's Olympics, 16 will be staged in the first five months of 2008. The National Stadium, dubbed the "Bird's Nest," will be the venue for the IAAF Race Walking Challenge from April 18-19 and the 2008 China Open Marathon on April 20.

 

On the other hand, the National Aquatics Center, also called the "Water Cube," will hold the China Open swimming event from February 1-5, the World Cup diving from February 19-24, and the Olympic qualification synchronized swimming from April 16-20.

 

Many other sports events such as canoe-slalom, beach volleyball, tennis, handball and equestrian also have been arranged at the Olympic venues to test the preparations for next August's Olympic Games.

 

For that reason the new venues have become attractive to world's top level athletes. The international sport federations also want to use the pre-Games events to promote their sports. The champion hopefuls of the 2008 Olympics may appear in the venues if they participate in the "Good Luck Beijing" events.

 

The "Good Luck Beijing" events are the games of the different international sport federations so that their marketing bears "personalized" characteristics and the organizers must abide by the relevant rules and regulations in their marketing activities.

 

From December 13-19 the ITTF Pro-Tour Grand Finals are scheduled to be held in Peking University Gymnasium, an Olympic venue too. The ITTF has signed a sponsorship agreement with an enterprise which won the relevant market rights. As the organizer of the ITTF event, the Chinese Table Tennis Association must honor the ITTF marketing rules and regulations, BOCOG Executive Vice-President Yang Shu'an was quoted as saying.

 

(BOCOG July 19, 2007)