Shenzhen ready to hold a unique Universiade
Updated: 2011-08-08 10:42
(Xinhua)
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BEIJING - The upcoming World University Games to be held next month in Shenzhen will be a unique edition with creative efforts being made, promised mayor of the South China city Xu Qin on Friday.
"With our efforts in the past four years, preparations (for Shenzhen Universiade) in all fields are ready," said Xu at a pre-games press conference in Beijing.
With twenty-one days to go ahead of the opening ceremony on August 12, the organizing committee of the 26th Universiade in Shenzhen has fulfilled their commitments since the successful bidding in 2007, having mobilized the whole city for the event.
According to Xu, the construction of venues, including 41 competition venues, 19 training venues and three spare ones, has been fully completed. The organizing work and pre-games test events have been run smoothly as operation teams for all venues are ready. The service and guarantee system is under smooth operation.
What makes the mayor most proud of is that some creative methods have been devised for torch relay, traffic control, as well as the opening and closing ceremonies, which highlight the concepts of low-carbon, environmental protection, and thrift.
"I could guarantee you a different Universiade, with?contracted opening and closing ceremonies, and competitive platform not just for games," said Xu.
To meet the promise of holding a low-carbon Universiade, Shenzhen event organizers have invented the online Virtual Torch Relay system, making short of the torch relay routine in reality but largely expanding the scale through internet, which has reduced the budget by 75 percent.
The creative ideas and general concepts of the opening and closing ceremonies emphasize on sports and rituals and promise no fireworks or super stars, instead, university students will be the main participants of the two ceremonies.
Also the organizers call up Shenzhen citizens to stop using private vehicles during the Universiade. "Compared with other international sports events, the Universiade is more like a platform for friendship and exchanges rather than pure competitions," said Xu.
"It reflects the innovation and creation of Shenzhen, and showcases its pursuit of exploring a new way to hold a Universiade with special characteristics," added the mayor.
The 26th Summer Universiade, slated for August 12-23, has 24 sports and 306 events, breaking records in terms of the events number in the history of Universiade.
By Thursday, a total of 11,310 people from 147 countries and regions have registered, among whom there are 7,587 athletes and 3,723 accompanying officials.
A Chinese delegation of 505 athletes selected from 110 universities will participate in 283 events, according to Hao Ping, vice chairman of the Organizing Committee of the Shenzhen Universiade, who's also the Vice Minister of Education in China.
The China Anti-Doping Lab will take the drug control tasks as a total of 714 urine tests, including 20 EPO tests, will be carried out during the Universiade.
"Twenty-three drug-testing stations have been set up at competition venues and eight stand-by drug-testing stations have been set up at preliminary competition venues," said Yang Shu'an, vice-minister of China's General Administration of Sports, at Friday's press conference.