President of the Organizing Committee for the XX Olympic Winter Games - Torino 2006 (TOROC)
Valentino Castellani speaks out about the Winter Games

Transatlantic magazine:
What exactly does your Olympic motto "passion lives here" mean and how does it relate to winter sports?
Valentino Castellani:
Passion lives here (La passione vive qui) is the motto of Torino 2006. A three-word concept to express, with simple immediacy, the spirit and values that are the hallmark of the XX Olympic Winter Games. Indeed, after the Cortina '56 and Roma '60 Olympics, it is now Torino's turn to show the whole world the Italian style, marked by the great passion Italians put in whatever they do.

You seem to be promoting an environmentally friendly Winter Olympics. What specifically does this involve and will this help the environment after the Olympics?
The respect of the environment was one of the strongest points in the Torino 2006 Bid file. All the environmental commitments were specified in the so-called "Green Card," a document included in the Candidacy dossier and evaluated by the IOC. Among the commitments, special attention was given to the minimization of the environmental impacts due to the venues' design and construction.

After the assignation of the Games, the Italian government, with a national law, required the implementation of the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA), a new management tool applied to the Torino 2006 Olympics for the first time in Italy. Within the SEA application a number of strategic plans were realized, concerning the major environmental issues related to the event preparation (inert waste, mobility, landscape, natural risks, water resources etc.). The water plan, in particular, allowed us to develop the artificial snow-making system with the lowest possible environmental impact. Following this analysis, the number of the new artificial basins was optimized in order to preserve the water resources.

How seriously are you taking the threat of terrorism and what plans do you have to protect the athletes and fans? How much is security going to cost?
This is a question that concerns not only the Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games but many different bodies. The Italian government is directly taking care of the security matter; Italian officials of all the security forces have been already studying this situation for years and they have been both in Salt Lake City and in Athens to check and learn about security operations during Olympic Games. We have been reassured that all the necessary measures will be taken. I can only say that during game time, the Olympic venues will be the safest place in Italy. The cost of the entire operation will depend on the number of forces the government will deploy, and therefore only the government will know the total cost.

In previous Winter Olympics, Italy had superstar skier Alberto Tomba dominating competition. Does Italy have anyone of his stature who will become an Olympic gold medalist in any of the various disciplines?
Alberto Tomba is a very famous athlete and he has been an icon of his discipline with fans and supporters all over Italy and in other countries as well, but Italy always had a very good tradition in alpine skiing and in other winter sports like cross-country. For Torino 2006, there will be many Italian athletes who will compete for a medal and who will inspire Italian fans and supporters with their passion. You never know who can win a gold medal, but we know we will have great athletes who will compete for that gold, like Giorgio Rocca, who's between the best slalom skiers in the whole circuit or Fabio Carta, a European champion in short track, a silver medalist at Salt Lake City and he is also from Torino. Other great Italian athletes are Chiara Simionato in speed skating Gabriella Paruzzi, Giorgio Di Centa and Silvio Fauner in cross-country, Laura Capurso in short track (she is also from Torino), Carolina Kostner (bronze in the World Championship in Moscow 2005) for figure skating or the legends of Italian figure skating, Barbara Fusar Poli and Maurizio Margaglio-who decided to come back to competitions for Torino 2006 and many others. Italy has plenty of great athletes who will inspire the Italian people and will compete for that gold.

The Winter Olympics have launched a campaign to make February's games
"a celebration of world peace." How exactly do you hope to end all wars and conflicts during the games? Is this realistic?
The tradition of the Olympic Truce or "Ekecheiria" ("lift your hands") goes back to the Olympic Games of the 9th century B.C. It provided a truce during the period the athletes and citizens of the Polis traveled to take part in or to be spectators in the Olympic Games. As the opening day of the games approached, the Sacred Truce was proclaimed and announced by the citizens who were traveling across Greece to transmit the message.

For today's Olympic Games, the IOC decided to revive the ancient institution of the Truce, with the idea of protecting the athletes and sports in general and contributing to the search for peace and for diplomatic solutions to conflicts.

The first initiative was launched in 1992 and it was immediately taken up by the United Nations. Since 1993, the General Assembly of the United Nations has repeatedly expressed its support for the Truce one year before each edition of the Olympic Games with an ad hoc resolution entitled "Building a peaceful and better world through sport and the Olympic ideal." With this resolution, the United Nations invited the member states to observe the Truce and solemnly recognize its importance, which was inserted in the Millennium Declaration in 2000.

Will there be a moratorium on the strict Italian anti-doping laws during the Winter Olympics?
That will depend on the government. We are working on that and I believe a solution will be found.

Will the Winter Olympics make a profit? How well are ticket sales going and are you getting many fans from the United States coming to the games? How much of the backing is with private funds and how much is from the government? Has the European Union given any funds for the games?
We are a privately owned non-profit foundation responsible for the organization of the Games, therefore we won't make any profit; if there is a profit it will be used for the post-use management of some of the venues. Our budget comes from TV rights, sponsorships, marketing and ticketing and is used for the operative organization of the Games. A different body called Agenzia Torino 2006, which is a public company, receives public funds and is in charge of all construction at the Games.

With 122 days to go, to the Torino 2006 Opening Ceremony, the ticket office has sold 56% of its tickets (more than 500,000 tickets), and for 63 competitions, more than 70% of the tickets available. No event is sold out yet, but it is better to hurry up, especially for the most requested events, such as figure skating and ice hockey. The U.S. is one of the countries with a big Olympic tradition; they follow us with particular interest and a large number of American supporters will be here during the Italian Games.

How do you plan on using the Winter Olympics as a vehicle to promote Turin, Italy, and Italian culture throughout the world?
The Olympic Games are always a great opportunity for a city and for a country to present themselves. Torino will benefit from new infrastructure and I'm not speaking only of sports arenas but also of an implemented transport system, a new cultural center of a new underground and several other projects, not strictly related to the Games, but things that the Games helped to happen. The city also will have the chance to propose itself as an Alpine city and as a cultural city throwing away Torino's industrial image. New tourism is already hitting town and new workplaces have been created thanks to the Games. These will be especially Italian Games and that will give us the opportunity to present Italy, our culture, our lifestyle, and most of all, our passion to the world.

Are there enough hotel rooms for fans to stay in Turin or will people have to stay in nearby towns?
Torino wasn't a major tourist destination in Italy, therefore the number of hotel rooms in town wasn't that big, but some new hotels have been built to host spectators, plus the entire area and region around Torino will host spectators coming to see the Games. Let's not forget that all the snow competitions will be in the mountains one hour away from the city and that means that all the places in between are good places to follow competitions both in Torino and in the mountains.

We also will host all the media in new apartment blocks (7 media villages will operate in Torino) that will be used as a University Campus or sold as private flats after the Games. In this way more hotel rooms will be available for spectators.

In the mountains, numerous private apartments (second houses for holidays) have been rented out for the Games and will be used to accommodate both media and spectators. It's not our responsibility to take care of spectators' accommodations, but we feel we have a moral obligation to provide it or to suggest the best solution to the people visiting Torino and to watch the competitions.

What happens if the weather does not cooperate and you have no snow? How will the games go on?
Nowadays it's almost easier to have winter sports competitions with no snow than with a lot of snow; snow-making systems are really modern and they can supply all a ski resort needs. We implemented the snow-making system of the Olympic Area (the famous ski area called Milky Way) creating new mountain basins (environmentally friendly) that can supply all the Olympic needs. Actually, we had a great test for our capacity to do competitions without snow last season. In fact, we have been running alpine skiing, cross-country, biathlon, snowboard and freestyle almost only on artificial snow. Last season was the worst for snow conditions in at least 20 years-only 40 centimeters of snow fell during the whole winter period and temperatures were really cold, especially in February. Nevertheless, we had perfect competitions in each discipline, thanks to our snow-making system and I'm talking about world cup races used as pre-Olympic tests. Of course, after a season like last one we hope for a season with lots of natural snow, but there is no problem at all with the Games.

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