The Asian Games have returned to Jakarta this summer and opened yesterday in the very Gelora Bung Karno Main Stadium built to hold that event back in 1962.
They would be forever known for the exploits of Dutch runner Fanny Blankers-Koen and a first Olympic gold medal for Czech Emil Zatopek.
Berlin's historic Olympic Stadium is playing its part this week in the staging of the first multi-event European Championships. While Glasgow is hosting aquatics, cycling, golf, gymnastics, rowing and triathlon until August 12, the athletics is about to take place in the cavernous arena originally built for the 1936 Olympics.
In retrospect it seems obvious. Every four years, you bring together a group of the most popular European sports championships and hold them at the same time, enabling them to create an exponential level of interest and appeal. Boom.
Given Tokyo’s official entry to the 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games bid race came nearly seven years ago, this week's two-year countdown to the event feels as though the Japanese capital city is coming off the bend and into the home straight.
When the 2018 World Fencing Championships, which run from July 19 to 27, were awarded to the Chinese hosts in 2015, the decision was applauded by China's Olympic champion Lei Sheng.
It began with a speech on 4 July in 2007 in Guatemala and it will end with handshakes, disappointment, joy and presentation of a small gold trophy in Moscow’s Luzhniki Stadium on 15 July 2018.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Wimbledon Championships, which get underway tomorrow, going open - a switch that has transformed the fortunes of generations of players, not to mention the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club which has hosted its event in south-west London since 1877.
Ivo Ferriani, who will seek a third consecutive four-year term as President of the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation (IBSF) this week, has apparently developed something of a mantra in recent years. "First four years - evaluation and creation. Second - implementation. Third - legacy".
It was a fitting coincidence that last Thursday's (June 14) signing of the Paris 2024 protocol - the proposed financial blueprint for the Games - took place in the Hôtel de Ville's lavish Salle des Arcades under a classically painted ceiling depicting the theme of architecture.
Next Wednesday (June 13), the FIFA Congress is due to convene in Moscow to decide the host of the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
Next Thursday evening (June 7) in central London, a group of rowing enthusiasts will stroll across the Thames from the terrace of the House of Commons and take up station outside St Thomas’ Hospital, where a memorial stone is to be unveiled.
It is coated with Oxfordshire dust, the legacy of its storage berth in a garden shed on the estate where Winston Churchill was born. But while it is showing its age, the navy blue plastic ring binder I hold in my hands deserves a place in Olympic business history.
A 2009 survey found that there were 11.8 million active skateboarders in the world. It also estimated that skateboarding was worth an estimated $4.8 billion (£3.5 billion/€4 billion) in annual revenue. Neither figure is likely to have diminished in the meantime.
Exactly 45 years ago today, Margaret Court, Australia's 30-year-old multiple Grand Slam winner, stepped onto a court in the tennis outpost of Ramona, California.
At the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, Iranian judoka Arash Miresmaeili was disqualified for weighing in at nearly four pounds above the limit for his weight class of his under-66 kilograms match against an Israeli opponent Ehud Vaks in the first round. It was claimed Miresmaeili had gone on an eating binge to protest the International Olympic Committee's recognition of the state of Israel. Iran does not recognise the state of Israel, and Miresmaeili's actions won praise from high-ranking Iranian officials. Mohammad Khatami, the country's President at the time, was quoted as saying Miresmaili's actions would be "recorded in the history of Iranian glories". He was later awarded $125,000 by the Government - the same amount given to Olympic gold medallists.
UEFA - International Relations Assistant - Nyon, Switzerland
The International Relations Assistant supports the daily operations of the UEFA Assist project and team. The role requires excellent communication and organisational skills, an aptitude for creating engaging digital content as well as the ability to oversee the financial management of projects.
Last time Jakarta hosted the Asian Games in 1962 it was an event overshadowed by a row over the participation of Israel and Taiwan. Philip Barker recounts how the Games led to a potential damaging split that caused a crisis in the Olympic Movement.
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