European Championships in Munich: Big rush at the start – Munich
The Olympiaberg, which was still green in the sun late on Wednesday afternoon, was suddenly sprinkled with colour: from a distance it looked as if thousands of flowers had sprout from the ground. There were 55,000 people who sat down on the grass all around to get a reasonably good overview of what was going to happen down in the Olympic Park. The best seats in front of the Theatron stage were already occupied, an hour before the Munich brass band Moop momthe German rapper Marteria and the indie rockers Sportfreunde Stiller should play at the opening of the European Championship, the multi-sport event that will be held in Munich from Thursday to August 21st. Shortly before eight o’clock, the organizers of the sports festival finally sent a message to all visitors who still wanted to come: “We strongly advise against coming. The Olympic Park is already overcrowded.”
The organizers could never have dreamed that the opening of the European Championships would have to be closed due to overcrowding. Although Marion Schöne, the managing director of Olympiapark GmbH, had already seen the glorious weather at the opening press conference in the afternoon as “an incredibly good omen” for the success of the event.
In the evening, there is a lot of hustle and bustle between the tower, swimming pool and stadium. Street performers entertained the audience: there was drumming, there strumming on electric guitars, elsewhere blowing alphorns, and in between stilt walkers made their way through the big hustle and bustle of mostly young people.
The mass rush WILL increase Schöne’s optimism that the eleven-day event WILL become the hoped-for public success, despite all the adversities in the preparation. By Wednesday, 250,000 tickets had been sold for a total of 177 competitions in the nine Olympic sports; The organizers are aiming for 450,000. “We are totally in good spirits,” said Schöne.
She shares the view with Paul Bristow, one of the inventors of this competition format, which was organized for the first time in 2018. In view of the park in front of him, which was just reviving the flair of the 1972 Olympic Games, he enthused: “This is the perfect place for such a multi-sport event. There is no other place in the world that would be better suited.” Correctly dressed in the buttoned-up blazer that one would expect of a real Bristow, Bristow stood in the blazing sun and said, “I get goosebumps just thinking about what we’re going to see here over the next few days.” If the Opening Ceremony is the right indicator, it WILL be a big celebration.