“An extraordinary park in an extraordinary borough”

Lord Coe has described Greenwich Park as an “extraordinary park in an extraordinary borough.”

Speaking to Greenwich.co.uk on day two of the recent test event in Greenwich Park, the Locog Chair said this is “a country that really does understand equestrian sport.” He said that the cross country event in Greenwich Park was “always going to be a hot ticket” after London 2012 said they are looking at modelling to increase spectator capacity for the event.

Asked about empty seats during the first day of the recent test event in Greenwich Park, Coe said there was “lots of schools, lots of people in there” and that focus of the test event was the “field of play and competitors” rather than the “spectator experience”.

Lord Coe also used the interview to put the damper on Greenwich Council’s idea of hosting a concert in Greenwich Park between the Olympics and Paralympics.

While the official line is that the is being “looked at” and “scoped”, Lord Coe said the gap between the events was “not like having ten days off” and that a “lot of work” would be going on to increase accessibility and reconfigure the venue.

The former Olympic gold medallist, urged future bidding cities to use their inner city parks to stage equestrian events. London 2012’s equestrian venue manager, Jeremy Edwards, who was also present for the interview, said that the temporary deck being used in Greenwich Park could “revolutionise the whole sport.”

On the test event in Greenwich Park

Lord Coe:

The best testimony of course is not out of the mouths of an organiser, delegate or whatever, it’s always going to be out of the mouths of the most important client group which is, of course, the competitors.

We’re getting very, very positive feedback but it doesn’t finish there because the next stage for all of us will be to sit down after the competition to talk about anything, all of their observations and there the observations that really matter. But so far, they’re very very positive about everything they’re witnessing, everything from the service levels, the stabling, the quality of the people out on the course.

[Criticisms of the surface did emerge from competitors following the next day’s show jumping stage of the Greenwich Park Eventing Invitational]

When you’ve got great internal teams, a great governing body, and volunteers who really do understand the equestrian world, you’ve got more than an evens chance of delivering a great event.

On empty seats during day one of the test event

Lord Coe:

Empty seats? Well, remember, first of all, most of that morning, they weren’t empty. Secondly, there was lots of schools in there, lots of people in there, it was first morning dressage. And actually in fairness, we’re not testing, at this moment, the spectator experience.

Our entire focus is on the field of play and competitors so I think it was a really good way to do it.

Jeremy Edwards:

If you go to any equestrian event, you don’t see people sitting there all of the time because it’s a moveable feast. Large groups were out on the course.

On bringing the equestrian events closer to the main Olympic venues

Lord Coe:

It’s a sport I understand. When we started bidding, a lot of the people that are here competing and coaching were the guys that came to me and said, ‘Look, of all the people that have organised the games  you understand the sport. If you possibly can, don’t let us become disembodied from the rest of the games. Don’t stick us four hours away’.”

When I competed in LA, I flew in two weeks early with part of the British equestrian team. I saw them at the airport and then I saw them again at the closing ceremony and when I came back. They were four hours away.

[Choosing Greenwich Park] was really important for three reasons:

First to be able to give the riders an Olympic experience for the first time in many years.

Secondly, as we’ve spoken about so many times, to introduce the sport to a group of people, particularly young people, who have probably never seen equestrian sport before.

And thirdly, you know, if you’re able to showcase an extraordinary park in an extraordinary borough, do it. If you’ve got the oportunity to have an equestrian event in the inner city, why would you want to take them three or four hours away when you can put them here.

Jeremy Edwards:

I can speak from experience, being at Sydney and also being at Beijing, at Hong Kong. Yes, it was lovely and great and all the rest of it. But those athletes didn’t get to march in the opening ceremony and I would imagine, if I was an athlete, the thing that I that would most want to do, other than win a gold medal of course, is to march in the opening ceremony.

And here we can do that. And be in the village.

Lord Coe:

Bidding cities will now feel they’ve got permission to stage equestrian events as near as to the games as they possibly can and if they’ve got big internal parks, use them.

Jeremy Edwards:

I think the other thing we should mention is that this deck and the temporary stables will potentially, I think, almost revolutionise the whole sport.

These guys can now take the deck, take the soil, take the stables and put it into any part of the world. Put it into shipping containers and ship it there and all of a sudden you’ve got a horse show.

And what says to the rest of the world is that you don’t have to go and build expensive long term infrastructure such as we built at Sydney. Now Sydney is 12 years old and now needs revamping. It needs doing up. The arenas need doing up. All these things need doing up and it’s expensive.  We can pack it up and move on. To me, this is fantastic, what we’ve developed here.

On using the stadium in Greenwich Park for a concert between the Olympics and Paralympics

London 2012 spokesperson:

We’re looking at it. There are challenges. But we do want to use that period between the end of the Olympics and the start of the Paralympics as a great party which will coincide with the Notting Hill Carnival. But I think we have to scope all of that and that’s something we will be discussing with Greenwich Council.

Lord Coe:

Sparing these guys’ blushes , it’s not like having 10 days off. There’s all sorts of things you are then thinking about for the Paralympic games. You’re thinking about increased levels of accessibility, you’re talking about some reconfiguration in all sorts of areas. There’s a lot of work that goes on in converting this from an Olympic to a Paralympic venue.

Jeremy Edwards:

It’s extremely busy, you’ve got one lot of horses out, one lot of horses in. There’s a different configuration, different contractors, a whole of raft of different people. The Paralympic committee come in and the IOC really move out. A whole new raft of faces turn up and we have to build the relationships.

Lord Coe:

It’s a good problem to have because its for the right reasons, but we have actually concertinaed the time between the Olympic games and the Paralympic games to make sure we lose none of the party atmosphere and the athlete led atmosphere.

At other games, the gap has been too long and it’s actually not helped the Paralympic movement. I think, for us, given that the Paralympic movement is so much our history, the importance of making sure that, given all the points been made about the management of conversion, that we’re also able to do it as quickly as we can so we don’t lose any of that momentum.

On demand for the cross country at London 2012

London 2012 spokesperson:

At the moment, the basic capacity is  50,000 but we’re doing crowd assessment modelling and we’re looking at transport, we might increase it.

Lord Coe:

It is worth remembering that the single biggest day out in British sport is cross country day at Badminton where you’ve effectively got the contents of 3 Wembley stadiums on the cross country course.

This is a country that really does understand equestrian sport and secondly, you’ve only got to lok at the numbers that equestrian events get in this country, particularly cross country, to know that this was always going to be a hot ticket.