ALL SPORTS

In a stunning decision that saw the early knockout of Chicago, despite personal lobbying from U.S. President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle, the IOC awarded the 2016 Summer Olympics to the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro.


In doing so, it also turned its back on a plea from former IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch to give his Spanish capital of Madrid the Games because “know that I am very near the end of my time.”


Voting results show Rio overwhelmingly trounced Madrid in the final round, collecting 66 of the 98 votes. But in the first ballot, Madrid led with 28 to 26 for Rio and 22 for Tokyo. Chicago, which had poured so much effort into winning, was knocked out on the first round with a mere 18 votes.


The results of the second and third ballots appear to show that most of the votes for the U.S. and Tokyo, which was knocked out in the second round, went to Rio. Madrid had only gained four votes from start to finish.


IOC vice-president Thomas Bach said the vote for Rio wasn’t a backlash by the IOC against the United States or the United States Olympic Committee, with which it has a testy financial relationship.


“I think it is a step toward universality with regards to organizing the Games,” he said. “So it is a good day for the Olympic Games. I don’t know whether (Chicago) was a favourite. But I also was surprised that Chicago did not make it to the second round.”


An angry television journalist from Chicago braced Bach, asking if, “with due respect,”; the IOC members had not just said “screw you” to the U.S., which contributes a huge amount of money to the Olympics.


“The United States today made a very impressive presentation,” he said. “This you cannot even say with all due respect. You should exercise respect to the votes and you should acknowledge that this was a fair competition among four cities and one has been elected.”


The American contingent was thunderstruck by its early defeat. A large contingent of media grew frustrated over lack of access to IOC members to ask them how it came to be that the U.S., a strategic Olympic partner, could only garner 18 votes in the first round.


But Chicago bid chairman Patrick Ryan refused to criticize the IOC, and instead took the high road.


“We introduced Chicago to the world,” he said. “Chicago is so much better known today and appreciated and respected — all around the world. Chicagoans can hold their heads high. We’re sorry we didn’t bring home a victory.”


Earlier, Samaranch had effectively called in a lifetime of Olympic chits, asking IOC members to understand that at 89, he might never see Spain host an Olympics again. The last one it held was in his home city of Barcelona in 1992.


But in selecting Rio de Janeiro as the host city for the next Olympics after the 2014 Sochi, Russia, Winter Games, the IOC bent to the entreaties of Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who said it was time the Olympics went to a new continent with the promise of opening new sporting frontiers.


“I honestly believe it is Brazil’s time. Among the top-10 economies of the world, Brazil is the only country that has not hosted the Olympic and Paralympic Games,” Lula told the IOC during Rio’s presentation earlier Friday afternoon. “For the others, it will be just one more Games.”


Rio’s improbable win came after a stunning defeat for Chicago in the first round.


When IOC president Jacques Rogge announced after the first round that Chicago had the least votes, a roar of shouts erupted from people watching the televised proceedings at Copenhagen’s Bella Center. Some were screams of joy. Others were angry shouts of outrage. Not a few people simply gasped.


And when the next vote revealed that Tokyo had also been dropped, the realization came swiftly that either Madrid or Rio, two countries steeped in Hispanic and Latin history, would host the next Games.


Lula told the IOC members his was a nation that was working hard to move out of poverty. He evoked images of a country where 30 million people had moved into the middle class and that owned the newest and richest offshore oil finds in the world.


But it was the spectre of the IOC not heeding to the call of universality that Lula pressed home most.


“This bid is not only ours. It is also South America’s bid, the bid of a continent with almost 400 million men and women and around 180 million youngsters. A continent that, as we saw, never hosted the Games. It is time to address this imbalance. For the Olympic movement, this decision will open a new and promising frontier.”


To award Rio the Games, the IOC had to ignore a concern that Brazil’s hosting of the 2014 FIFA World Cup would eat into potential marketing revenues in the first five years of Olympic preparation. But Lula and Rio’s other bidders pledged at various times that Brazil has the financial capability to carry the bid’s $14 billion US cost. That amount was among the largest of the bidders, but the IOC seemed not to hold that against Rio.