A record 10 cities are competing for the 2002 Winter Games, including three of the five that bid against Salt Lake City for the last Winter Olympics awarded.
That was nearly three years ago, when Salt Lake City lost the 1998 Winter Games to Nagano, Japan, but finished ahead of the cities that stayed in the competition until the end - Jaca, Spain; Aosta, Italy; and Ostersund, Sweden.Jaca and Ostersund are trying again for the 2002 Winter Games, along with Sochi, Russia. Sochi, a resort community on the shore of the Black Sea, dropped out shortly before the International Olympic Committee met to make its choice.
Another Italian city, Tarvisio, has replaced Aosta. Aosta is near Italy's border with France while Tarvisio is located in the northeast corner of Italy at the borders of Austria and Slovenia.
One of the new cities bidding, Graz, Austria, is just 45 miles away from Tarvisio, in Austria's eastern mountains near the borders of Slovenia and Hungary.
Two of the new cities bidding are located in recently created nations. Alma Ata, Kazakhstan, is the capital of thew new country and is in the southern part of the former Soviet Union, just north of China.
Poprad, Slovakia, is located in the eastern Tatry Mountains of the country created just a year ago, when Czechoslovakia split into two nations.
Sion, Switzerland, is also bidding pending the results of a referendum election later this year. The toughest competition Salt Lake City faces is generally considered to be from Quebec, Canada.
But Tom Welch, head of the Salt Lake Olympic Bid Committee, isn't so sure Quebec City is the city to beat even though Quebec will likely end up spending millions more than its competitors.
"Sweden and Switzerland . . . have the potential of being as strong or stronger than Quebec," Welch said. "I think it's too early to tell how they'll shake out."
He predicted that four of the 10 cities will drop out of the competition sometime before the IOC makes its choice in June 1995 but declined to name them.
"For some communities, just being involved in the hunt is enough," Welch said. "There is nothing short of declaring war on another country that brings as much attention to a country."
Meanwhile, having an unprecedented number of cities in the race can only help Salt Lake City's chances of getting the Games, he said. "If there were only two or three cities, one would automatically become a favorite," he said.