International Olympic Committee President Kirsty Coventry is set to spend a day in Utah next week with organizers of the 2034 Winter Games.
During her overnight visit on Sept. 23, Coventry is expected to include meetings with Gov. Spencer Cox, Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall and leaders of the Utah Legislature as well as trips to Olympic venues and stops at both a Salt Lake City elementary school and an ice rink.
An Olympic champion swimmer from Zimbabwe, Coventry was elected the IOC’s first woman and first African president last year and is likely to preside over Utah’s second Winter Games. She succeeded Thomas Bach, who announced in Paris in 2024 that Utah would host again.
Coventry hasn’t been to Utah since coming to the state years ago to teach a swimming clinic. Her stop is part of a longer trip to the United States, which is also hosting the next Summer Games, in 2028 in Los Angeles.
“Of course, we’re extremely excited,” Fraser Bullock, president and executive chair of the Organizing Committee for the 2034 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games, told the Deseret News, calling the visit informal since Coventry will be accompanied only by her chief of staff.
He invited Coventry to visit Utah last February, when the pair sat down together during the 2026 Winter Games in Milan-Cortina, Italy. Bullock said then that the new leader of the Switzerland-based IOC was eager to come.
“She’s very gracious to make time in her calendar to fit in this trip between other obligations in the United States,” Bullock said. He said organizers want her “to experience the beauty of Utah, the outstanding people that we have here (and) the warm friendliness that everyone exudes.”
It will also be a chance for her to discuss the organizing committee’s work. Tuesday, the steering committee for the 2034 Winter Games met, reviewing new programs aimed at using the Olympics to educate students and making sports more accessible to them.
The advisory committee, made up of community, sport and business leaders, as well as athletes and elected officials, were told another effort has been launched to encourage involvement, the “elevate initiative.”
Looking for ‘groundbreaking ideas’ for Utah’s 2034 Games
The initiative’s leader, Scott Givens, who served as creative director for Utah’s 2002 Winter Games, said it’s intended to identify “groundbreaking ideas, what could really take Utah 2034 and our Games to the next level.”
After what he called brainstorming sessions with organizers and others associated with the Olympics past and present, Givens said he counted 118 ideas, many around enhancements for athletes and their families.
Transforming 2034 into an “experiential Games” also ranked high, he said, comparing it to Utah Mammoth owner Ryan Smith’s efforts to make “joining a Mammoth game more than a ticket sale” for hockey fans.
Without getting into specifics, Givens said “we’ve got lots of ideas that make 2034 and our Games the experience of a lifetime.” While that will help sell tickets, he said there’s also an emphasis on creating “the broadest access and participation for the widest array of Utahns.”
Other ideas also being considered as a result of the process revolve around shaping the branding, positioning the Paralympics, and contributing to the impact and legacy of hosting a second Winter Games, Givens said.
The board overseeing the organizers of the privately funded Winter Games that have a $4 billion price tag, money expected to be raised largely from the sale of broadcast rights, sponsorships and tickets, also held a private meeting.
Asked later Tuesday about public input into the “elevate initiative,” Bullock said having a way for people to submit what they want from the 2034 Winter Games was a good idea. “Let us go to work on that,” he said, suggesting it could be set up through the utah2034.org site.
