ATR First: Lima 2019 Must Work Around the Clock

(ATR) PanamSports president Neven Ilic tells Around the Rings it will take constant work for Lima, Peru to be ready for the 2019 Pan American Games.

"I think that it’s difficult, but if you work very hard 24 hours I think it will be possible to reach," he tells ATR in an exclusive interview. "We don’t have time available to stand around. We have to work every day."

The Lima 2019 Organizing Committee, led by president Carlos Neuhaus, is scheduled to choose the construction company that will build its Athletes Village on Sep. 8 out of a shortlist of seven companies from China, Peru and Spain.

With less than two years until the opening ceremony on July 26, Ilic laments that the organizers are so far behind on preparations but that it is now time for action and not complaining.

"I have always said that we are late," he says. "We lost many years but the real situation is this situation that we have today and we are working on the program and we decided that we are together.

"When you give this opportunity to the country or the city six years before, everyone expects that you go in a different program and do different things every year, and now we have to do everything in the last two years.

"But this is the situation, and under the situation they are working very well with the program we have decided."

This program includes two upcoming visits by PanamSports leaders. A construction commission will travel to Lima on Aug. 21 to ensure that the construction timelines are appropriate and that all companies are secured to build the remaining venues.

Ilic and his fellow PanamSports executives will then make their own inspection of Lima 2019’s progress beginning on Oct. 9. The leadership will be joined by the technical, coordination and construction commissions who will stay in Lima for a week to provide help and advice to the OCOG.

He tells ATR that PanamSports, also known as PASO, will also begin to negotiate a broadcasting rights deal during its visit to Lima.

"We have two years until the games and we have to decide many things in October," he says.

October will also mark the opening of PanamSports' new offices in Miami, Florida. Ilic tells ATR that they are in the process of signing the contract and that the delay in the original opening of mid-July is due to the previous tenant.

The opening of additional office space outside of the Mexico City headquarters is part of PanamSports' efforts to revitalize its brand.

"We are working very hard on this," Ilic says. "We are hiring a company in the U.S., mainly to do a big research or study of what is the real situation of PASO, what are the values of PASO and what are the values of the Pan American Games? We will spend around 60 days to decide what we have."

The company is expected to help design a new web page, new logo and study the feasibility of organizing other competitions. Ilic says he plans to present proposed changes on the heels of the ANOC General Assembly this November in Prague, Czech Republic.

"We hope to present to the assembly what is the new vision and new situation in terms of the brand, marketing and media, everything," he says. "We want to present in November the new idea of the new image of PASO."

Written by Kevin Nutley

Homepage photo: Getty Images

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