Celebration event planned for Wandsworth on Monday July 23rd
LONDON 2012 have announced more details about the days the Olympic torch will spend in south-west London next summer.
The torch will arrive in the capital seven days before the start of the Games and will visit every borough before the opening ceremony in Stratford on Friday July 27th.
It will pass through Merton on Monday July 23rd before arriving in Wandsworth, the long time former home of the British Olympic Association, for an evening celebration event.
Wimbledon’s tennis heritage is expected to feature strongly on the route, whose specific details will be revealed next year, with the All England Club, a venue for Olympic tennis events, tipped to feature.
The following day the torch will start its journey in Kingston and pass through Richmond while it visits Kensington and Chelsea and Hammersmith and Fulham, en route to a celebration event in central London on the eve of the Games, on Thursday July 26th.
Meanwhile, in a bid to ease congestion on London roads and take pressure off Police, the flame will also spend the final day of its journey towards the opening ceremony travelling from Hampton Court Palace up the River Thames.
Leading British Olympians are feature to feature among the relay runners while organisers Locog and relay sponsors Lloyds TSB, Samsung and Coca-Cola will announce hundreds of inspirational local residents, nominated to carry the torch, next year.
London 2012’s organising committee Locog claim 95 percent of the British population will be within ten miles of the Olympic flame as it makes its 8,000 mile journey around the United Kingdom.
Organisers have also revealed how the flame will travel by a large range of alternative modes of transport, including a sidecar on the Isle of Man, home of the famous TT Races, the Alum Bay chairlift on the Isle of Wight and a mountain railway to the summit of Snowdon.
In addition there are plans for the torch to fly across the Eden Project in a hot air balloon, travel across Loch Ness in a boat and fly down a zip wire off the Tyne Bridge in Newcastle. It will also journey on horseback, bicycle, tram, rowing boat and steam train.
As expected some of Britain’s postcard landmarks will feature heavily, with the flame visiting the summit of the 1085 metre Snowdon in north Wales, the Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland, the Needle’s off the Isle of Wight, Stonehenge, Durdle Door on the Jurassic Coast and St Andrew’s, the home of golf, in Scotland.
“I’m delighted that the Olympic torch relay will take the 2012 Games to almost every corner of the UK and that we have achieved our ambition to take the flame to within an hour’s journey of 95% of the population,” said London 2012 chairman Seb Coe.
“Now everyone is invited to plan their welcome and find out where they can go to be part of this historic occasion. The Olympic Games are coming to you as the Olympic flame gives our people and places their moment to shine.”
IN PICTURES: Landmark stops for London 2012 Olympic torch relay
