(ATR) World Athletics President Sebastian Coe will visit Tokyo on Thursday despite the current worldwide pandemic.
It was announced on Tuesday that Coe will inspect the track at the Olympic Stadium and meet with Tokyo 2020 President Yoshiro Mori during his trip.
Under current Japanese government guidelines, it appears Coe will be allowed into the country due to "exceptional circumstances". His native United Kingdom, Monaco (where World Athletics is based) and France are all on the list of 162 banned countries. Foreign nationals who have stayed in a banned country within 14 days prior to arrival in Japan are not allowed to enter.
World Athletics CEO Jon Ridgeon and Director of Competition and Events Jakob Larsen will be accompanying Coe.
The meeting with Mori and subsequent press conference at the Tokyo 2020 office was announced on the same day Tokyo 2020 confirmed that a female employee in her 40’s who works at the office had tested positive for Covid-19. Her last day working on site was September 28. She is the fifth person working for Tokyo 2020 to be infected.
Coe’s visit will come a day after the latest monthly IOC Executive Board meeting via videoconference on Wednesday.Tokyo 2020 will be front and center with a report by the chair of Coordination Commission John Coates on the agenda.
The specifics of a simplification plan to reduce costs and increase efficiencies will undoubtedly be discussed. Tokyo 2020 officials and IOC leaders led by Coates agreed to more than 50 measures at a two-day virtual meeting late last month.
The reduction of stakeholder personnel attending the Games, streamlining transportation services, adjusting spectator activities at venues, and hosting various pre-Games meetings online were included on the list.
IOC Olympic Games executive director Christophe Dubi admitted after that meeting "we have many measures and they look small, but when you take them all together it will represent a large result in terms of both simplification and hopefully as well, since you are making the calculations, produce some significant savings."
Neither Tokyo 2020 nor the IOC has given any estimates on the amount of money being saved.
Dubi said further measures to cut costs will be explored. So far no one has shown any appetite to include the Opening and Closing Ceremonies or the Torch Relay in this simplification process.
Written by Gerard Farek
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