The vision that will re-establish Thessaloniki on the world map
3 min read
In 2004 Juice Bolt first came to Greece, running 200m. at the Olympic Games in Athens. In 2007 he ran the first 100th of his career in Rethymno. In 2009 he competed in Thessaloniki as the fastest man of all time and this year he made his vacation in Mykonos. In 2019 he will visit Greece for the fifth time, but this will be done to hear a great “thank you” from the Greeks and give a tremendous boost to the Thessaloniki arena.
It all started in 2009 when Yuseen Bolt
came to run in Thessaloniki 23 days after the world athletics
championship in Berlin where he had made the space performance 9.58 at
100m. and 19.19 at 200m. World records that are hard to beat. Jamaican
would never come to Thessaloniki if the IAAF contact person, Yannis
Nicolaou, did not actually intervene to cancel his participation in the
Shanghai and Daegu meetings to come to Greece.
Bolt said twice, not to Chinese and Korean, agreeing to come to
Thessaloniki with less than what he would pay to Shanghai and Daegu. He
came, ran 19.68 in the 200th, filled the Kaftanzoglio stadium for two
consecutive days with a total of 60,000 people and left Greece with the
then deputy minister of sport Yannis Ioannidis not to fully fulfill the
agreement he had with Bolt’s associates.
This poor image of
Bolt for Greece wants to change Central Macedonia Regional Governor
Apostolos Tzitzikostas, with the support of the deputy mayor of the
municipality of Thessaloniki Giorgos Dimarellos, the president of the
Kafantzoglio Stadium Apostolos Mitinzis and the historical club of
Hermes 1877. Thus began the plan to visit Yusein Bolt again in
Thessaloniki, at a major tracking event to be held in 2019 with him
being the honored person. This is a very big project that will put
Thessaloniki on the world map of the track. In order to do this,
however, the projects at the central stage that Apostolos Mantzitsis has
asked most of all to replace the athletics track.
In 2019, the Greek track will be even higher than today, as several new children will have stitched the current stars, Stephanides, Filippidis, Papachristou, Kyriazis and at last the Greek fans will have the opportunity, ten years after this terrific world final of track and field , in addition to Bolt, there were still huge athletes such as Kenenisa Bekele, David Ruizsa, Ezekiel Keboy, Thyssen Gay, Andreas Thorcyllansen, Emmanuelle Merga, Virgilly Alena, and huge athletes like Alison Fili Sonia Richards, Blanka Vlasic, Jelena Isbebeva (4.80m the stage record she had made and waiting for Katerina Stephanid to get it), Seli An Freser Pryce, Carmelite Jetter, Messer Deftar, Trones Dibampa , Valerie Adams, Britney Rees and many more. Since then, there has never been such a rehearsal in Greece yet, while only the finals of the Davidmig League can be compared.
The vision of Apostolos Tzitzikostas and the rest of the “team” … athletics is something that he deserves to be supported by all the Northern Greeks. Only positive ones exist from such initiatives.
