Paris Olympics 2024: With 100 days to go, a guide to the Summer Games

It has now been seven years since Paris was awarded the right to host the 2024 Summer Olympics. The moment of reckoning is now with the clock on the Games ticking down to 100 days. In exactly 100 days, more than 10,000 athletes and tens of thousands of fans will converge for the start of the 33rd Summer Games.

The previous edition, held in Tokyo, delayed by a year due to the coronavirus pandemic and held in a controlled capacity, saw India win seven medals, including a historic gold for Neeraj Chopra, to finish 48th in the tally - highest ranking in over four decades. Mirabai Chanu, Lovlina Borgohain, PV Sindhu, Ravi Kumar Dahiya, Bajrang Punia, Neeraj and the men’s hockey team bagged medals in Japan.

That’s in the past. Athletes will now be able to showcase their talents in front of packed crowds in the French capital. It will be the first time the City of Lights will host the Olympics in a century.

When are the Paris Olympics?

The opening ceremony to mark the Games ‘open’ will be held on 26 July. But the sporting action, as is the norm, will get underway on 24 July with group games in football, rugby sevens, handball and archery. The Games will run until 11 August.

Where will the opening ceremony take place?

The slogan for the Paris Olympics is “Games Wide Open” and in keeping with that, it will be the first time an opening ceremony of the Summer Games will not take place in a stadium but on river Seine.

As per the ambitious plan, a 6 kilometer boat parade will mark the opening ceremony in front of as many as 3,25,000 onlookers (originally proposed to be 6,00,000) on the river’s banks. Each national delegation will travel on boats equipped with cameras to allow TV and online viewers to get a close look. The parade will come to the end in front of the Trocadéro.

The parade will depart from the Austerlitz bridge beside the Jardin des Plantes and make its way around the two islands at the centre of the city before passing under several bridges and gateways.

Athletes on the parade boats will get glimpses of some of the official Games venues, including Parc Urbain La Concorde, the Esplanade des Invalides, the Grand Palais, and lastly the Iéna bridge where the parade will come to a stop before the ceremony’s finale at the Trocadéro.

However, French president Emmanuel Macaron has said the opening ceremony could be moved to the Stade de France in Saint Denis should there be a security threat of keeping the event in the open.

Which are the new sports at the Paris Olympics?

Breaking (also known as break dancing) will make its debut as an Olympic sport while skateboarding, sport climbing and surfing will return from the Tokyo Olympics. Karate, softball and baseball won’t be part of the programme.

Breaking was first introduced at the 2018 Youth Olympics. With the combination of athleticism and urban dance, the sport has been included in the programme. There is also the fact that organisers and IOC are looking to target a young population. The competition will take place as solo battles and the breakers will groove to the DJ’s tracks, including moves such as windmills, the six step and freezes.

Four events have been dropped from weightlifting. In canoeing, two sprint events have been replaced with two slalom events. In sport climbing, the “combined” event has been split to create the separate events of “speed climbing” and “boulder-and-lead” for both genders.

What are the venues for the Paris Olympics?

Paris Olympics will see 32 sports, 329 medals events in at least 35 venues across 16 days. To handle such sheer volume, the Games will be held not just in Paris but also other cities across metropolitan France.

Some of Paris’ landmarks will be immediately recognisable to worldwide audience. Beach volleyball will take place at a temporary outdoor arena at the Champ de Mars, a large public park at the foot of the Eiffel Tower. Equestrian and modern pentathlon competitions will take place at the Palace of Versailles, one of the emblems of French royal history. The 124-year-old Grand Palais will host fencing and taekwondo events.

Stade Yves-du-Manoir, the home of the opening ceremony at 1924 Paris Olympics, will be put to use once again. This time, the 117-year-old arena will stage field hockey competitions.

Stade de France will host the athletics and the closing ceremony on 11 August. The Parc des Princes, home to Paris St-Germain, will stage football matches, and Roland Garros will host tennis and boxing events.

Majority of events will take place in France with one exception. The surfing competition will take place in a village on the southwestern coast of Tahiti - 10,000 miles from Paris. The organisers chose to hold the surfing events on the French Polynesian island because it “offers an opportunity to engage French overseas territories and their communities in the Olympic Games — for the first time in history — while showcasing France’s rich and diverse heritage.”

Nearly 95% of the venues either existed or are temporary, with the aquatics centre the only new venue specifically built for the Games.

How many Indians have qualified for Paris Olympics?

India had sent its largest contingent to Tokyo with 126 athletes competing across 18 events. With 100 days to go, it is still not clear how many will make the trip. So far, 42 Indian athletes have qualified for the Games in France but that number will go up in the weeks to come as qualification events in different sports get underway.

Shooting has seen India book 20 quota places for the Paris Olympics followed by athletics (9), table tennis (6), badminton (5), boxing (4), archery, equestrian, men’s hockey team, sailing and weightlifting (1).

What is the prize money for winners at Paris Olympics?

Olympic medallists didn’t earn prize money from either IOC or global federations. That trend has been bucked by World Athletics who will hand out $50,000 cash prizes to gold medallists at the Games in Paris.

Sebastian Coe, head of the World Athletics body, said a total prize pot of $2.4 million has been earmarked for this summer’s Olympics in Paris. He elaborated the money will come from the revenue shared by IOC for the Summer Games.

Any chances of protests at the Paris Olympics?

With the aim of openness comes the challenge of maintaining security. Europe’s most densely populated city has been shadowed by safety concerns in the last couple of months. French officials have insisted that they are putting strict security measures in place - even if it means taking help of allies. A “classic approach adopted by host countries when organising major international events,” the Interior Ministry had said.

France have said it would deploy 45,000 police, military officers and army troops across the country during the Games. Everyone involved in the Games — security officials, building workers, volunteers — will be put through background checks.

Yet the recent history of violence in France — including the 2015 terror attack in Paris that left 138 people dead and at least 416 injured — causes concern.

The geopolitical backdrop to the Games is equally troubling. The war between Israel and Hamas has crossed the six-month mark, raising fears of conflict and wider regional instability. The devastation in the Gaza Strip has provoked international outrage. The recent attack by Iran has only added to nerves.

Meanwhile, Russia continues to gain ground in its military offensive against Ukraine with the war raging into its third year.

These international crises could come into play during the Paris Olympics in the form of protests and other political demonstrations.

What is the status of Russian and Belarusian athletes?

It’s still not clear whether any athletes from Russia and Belarus who are expected to qualify will actually go. Following a decision last year, IOC will let them compete as “neutrals,” meaning they can’t use their country’s flag or anthem, participate in team sports or be on one of the boats in the opening ceremony. Athletes with links to the military or who have expressed support for the war against Ukraine will be banned.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has questioned the rules and asked the Russian Olympic Committee and the Sports Ministry to recommend whether the country’s athletes should compete in Paris.

IOC expects that 36 Russian athletes — and possibly as many as 54 — will do well enough at qualifying events to compete in Paris.

Russia had sent 335 athletes to Tokyo — winning 20 golds among 71 total medals. They competed without national symbols at that Olympics, the Winter Games in 2018 and 2022 because of a doping scandal.

Ukraine, meanwhile, has opposed Russians participating at the Paris Olympics, even as neutrals, but has eased its policy of boycotting events. IOC President Thomas Bach has suggested that “threats of boycotts” from the two countries were no longer an issue.