With that in mind, we’ll be preparing a weekly feature article about the sports, the athletes, the Pan American idea or anything somehow related to the Games. Don’t worry, it won’t be that kind of boring stuff that fills up the official sites of every big event. We’ll do our best to keep up with the unique journalistic style of PV Pulse, offering our readers something more than a simple news report.
So, to officially start with the PV Pulse Pan American coverage, let’s take a look back to the history of the Pan American movement. According to Wikipedia, “Pan-Americanism is a movement which, through diplomatic, political, economic and social means, seeks to create, encourage and organize relationships, associations and cooperation between the states of the Americas in common interests.”
Following these principles, there are Pan American organizations that cover a wide array of issues such as health, human rights, science, peace and yes, sports! The organization that oversees the games is the Pan American Sports Organization (PASO), and is made of 42 countries from South, Central and North America.
I won’t bore you much more with history, but let me just say that the first Pan American Games are known as the games that never were. In 1940, the first Pan American Sports Congress was held in Buenos Aires, announcing that the first continental games were going to be held in that same city, two years later. Sadly, a poster is all that is left from those games, as the war made it impossible to hold a celebration of sports when people were dying all over the world.
Nine years later in 1951, Buenos Aires finally host the long-anticipated first Pan American Games with more than 2,500 athletes from 22 countries. Since then, the Games have been held every four years in cities such as Chicago, Mexico City, Caracas, La Habana, Indianapolis, Winnipeg and Rio.
Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta
The idea of bringing the Pan American Games to Guadalajara was first proposed at the end of last century. Mexico City had already host two editions of the Games in 1955 and 1975, which kind of eliminated it as a viable candidate for future events. In a country as centralized as Mexico is, to even think that a city other than the capital could organize an international event was revolutionary, to say the least. But the idea was there and Guadalajara had all the conditions to host the Games. So, Guadalajara’s candidacy for the 2003 Pan American Games was launched with great expectations, only to fall short and be beaten by Santo Domingo.
The decision to give the 2003 Pan American Games to Santo Domingo came as a shock, as it was widely expected that Guadalajara was going to get them, as it had put in place a great candidacy and was counting with the decisive support of Mario Vázquez Raña, the Mexican president of the PASO. But things didn’t work out as expected, and the failure to get the Games in 2003 was a pill hard to swallow for the proud “Tapatíos” (Guadalajara’s citizens).
The political situation in 2007 wasn’t the ideal to make a second push for the Games, but when the selection process for the 2011 Pan American Games opened up, Guadalajara was ready to try again and this time with success.
Since the official announcement that the Pan American Games were going to be held in Guadalajara, the city has undergone a big-scale transformation with major improvements on infrastructure, the construction of new venues and the renovation of others.
But this transformation isn’t restricted to Guadalajara, as places such as Lagos de Moreno, Ciudad Guzmán, Chapala, Tapalpa and Puerto Vallarta are part of the Games as they will be hosting different events.
The XVI Pan American Games are just around the corner. 5,000 athletes will be competing on 46 different sports, with Puerto Vallarta holding the events of triathlon, beach volleyball, sailing and swimming in open water, starting on Sunday October 16th at the Pan American Beach Volleyball Stadium.
Let the Games begin!
Next week: Puerto Vallarta and the Games: all the venues, events, dates and important information about the Pan American Games in our city.
