The 2012 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the Games of the XXX Olympiad, are due to take place from 27th July to 12th August 2012.

It’s been two years since the Beijing 2008 Closing Ceremony. The handover ceremony marked the moment when Beijing 2008 handed over the Olympic Flag to the new host city of London.

London previously hosted the Olympics in 1908 and 1948. For 2012 it beat Paris, Madrid, Moscow, New York

Throughout the process and up to the vote at the 117th IOC Session, Paris was widely seen as the favourite to win the nomination, particularly as this was its third bid in recent history. Originally London was seen lagging Paris by considerable margin, however this started to improve with the appointment of Sebastian Coe as new head of London 2012 on 19 May 2004.


On 6 July 2005, the final selection was announced at the Raffles City Convention Centre in Singapore. The final two cities left in contention were London and Paris. At the end of the fourth round of voting, London won the right to host the 2012 Games with 54 votes, defeating Paris’s 50.

The London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games was created to oversee the staging of the Games after the success of the bid, and held their first board meeting on 7 October 2005.

The committee, chaired by Lord Coe, is in charge of implementing and staging the games, while the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) is in charge of the construction of the venues and infrastructure, such as the stadiums, transport and Olympic village accommodation.

The 2012 Summer Olympic program features 26 sports and a total of 39 disciplines. The 2012 Paralympic Games program has 20 sports and 21 disciplines. London’s bid featured 28 sports, in line with other recent Summer Olympics, but the IOC voted to drop baseball and softball from the 2012 Games two days after it selected London as the host city.

The International Olympic Committee executive board met on August 13, 2009 and approved the addition of women’s boxing to the program.

Other sports considered were karate, squash, golf, roller sports and rugby sevens. Karate and squash were the two final nominees, but neither received enough votes to reach the required two-thirds majority. The IOC is considering the addition of golf and sevens rugby for the 2016 games.  The only uncertain thing for the Olympics London 2012 will be the English weather!