IOC selects three cities as Candidates for the 2020 Olympic Games

24 MAY 2012
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced today that Istanbul (Turkey), Tokyo (Japan) and Madrid (Spain)* have made it on to the shortlist of cities bidding to host the 2020 Olympic Games. The Candidate Cities were accepted from among five Applicant Cities, which also included Baku (Azerbaijan) and Doha (Qatar).Please click here for the full report of the Working Group which made a technical assessment of the five Applicant Cities. 

The IOC takes the opportunity to thank all the Applicant Cities for their hard work, dedication and support of the Olympic Movement.

Event	Deadline
Olympic Games Observers’ Programme – London 2012	27 July – 12 August 2012
London 2012 debrief in Rio de Janeiro	November 2012
Submission of Candidature Files to the IOC	7 January 2013
Visits by the IOC Evaluation Commission to the Candidate Cities	February- April 2013
Report by the 2020 IOC Evaluation Commission	July 2013
2020 Briefing for IOC Members	July 2013
Election of the Host City of the 2020 Olympic Games	7 September 2013 125th IOC Session, Buenos Aires

The three Candidate Cities will now be requested to prepare their Candidature File with an in-depth description of their Olympic project. They will also prepare for the visit of the IOC Evaluation Commission. The Evaluation Commission will make a detailed technical assessment of each candidature and publish a report in advance of the 2020 Briefing for IOC Members in July 2013. The following timetable has been established for this phase:

Please note: the Candidature Procedure and Questionnaire, which outlines the procedures, rules and deadlines to be respected until the election of the host city, as well as the in-depth questionnaire which Candidate Cities must respond to in their Candidature File, is available on the IOC website here.

The election of the host city will take place on 7 September 2013 at the IOC Session in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

* Cities are listed in the order of drawing of lots

Note to editors:

The two bid phases (Applicant and Candidate) were introduced by the IOC in 2000 to ensure that cities insufficiently prepared or considered not to have the potential to successfully organise theOlympic Games in the year in question, did not proceed to the second phase of bidding, thus ensuring significant cost savings both to the bid cities and the IOC.

As part of its mission to continually monitor and improve the bid process, the IOC recently brought forward some technical matters and questions regarding existing conditions that would not change between the two phases from the Applicant City questionnaire to the Candidate City questionnaire. Phase 2 has thus become a logical continuation of Phase 1, rather than a new start.