Canoe Course is First Olympic Venue to Secure Major Event Post ’12

The first major event to be staged by an Olympic venue after the 2012 Games has been confirmed as the 2015 Canoe Slalom World Championships – to be staged at London’s Lee Valley course.

The host to the 2012 Olympic canoe slalom events beat competition from Bourg-Saint-Maurice in the French Alps with London’s Olympic venues having already failed in bids to host the 2015 World Athletics and 2014 Hockey World Cup.

The Lee Valley White Water Centre was the first brand new London 2012 venue to be completed, at a cost of £31m (US$50.4m) in December 2010 and Britain’s top slalom canoeists have had exclusive use of the course since then, before Lee Valley opens to the public – and foreign rivals – on April 22.

Bringing major events in Olympic sports to Britain after the Games have concluded is a cornerstone of the London 2012 organising committee’s ambition to deliver what it calls a ‘legacy’ after the Olympics. However, London’s bid to stage the 2015 World Championships in Athletics was withdrawn in November 2010 as continued uncertainty over the future of the Olympic Stadium meant the bid team could not even guarantee a running track would remain in place.