Following the completion of the Olympics, healing the £40m London Aquatics Centre will serve the local area, catering for all levels of swimming ability from families to people with disabilities and school children.

With moveable floors capable of reducing the depth for swimming lessons it is hoped the two 50m pools and diving pool at the Aquatic Centre will encourage more people to swim more often.

The centre will offer an activity programme including a range of aquatic fitness sessions, a learn to swim programme, coaching in water polo, synchronised swimming, diving and sub aqua.

Not only will the centre be a great asset for local communities and schools, it will also offer visitors the chance to use the Olympic facilities for the same price as the average local pool or sports centre.

Earlier in March, 300 local schoolchildren tested the centre’s water, with swimmers aged between 9 and 18 years old competing in a number of races at the annual Six Host Borough Swimming Championship.

The event, organised by the Olympic Park Legacy Company and Greenwich Leisure Limited (GLL), gave the community their first taste of their new swimmingfacility.

Andrew Altman, Chief Executive of the Olympic Park Legacy Company, said: “The Host Borough Swimming Championships was a taste of things to come. The atmosphere was electric and the excitement of the young swimmers was evident as soon as they entered the centre. We want all local children to experience this when the centre reopens after the Games.”

With an anticipated 800,000 visitors a year, the Aquatics Centre will be a London legacy and a place where the UK’s best sporting talent can swim and train.

GLL Managing Director, Mark Sesnan added: “Not only is this a world class venue designed to host international sport, it also aims to nurture sporting talent at grass roots level and encourage healthy living.”

Together with GLL and Olympic Park Legacy Company, Sport England is currently working with the Amateur Swimming Association, five London boroughs and the University of East London to develop a strategy and usage programme that will allow swimmers and divers to progress from recreation to international performance.

In addition, the Aquatic Centre will also be used to host major events with Triathlon England and British Swimming planning to use the venue regularly. In March this year London bid to host the 2016 LEN European Swimming Championships at the Aquatics Centre.

Sepp Blatter, President of world soccer’s governing body FIFA, says he will step down from his post in 2015, if he is re-elected for a fourth term in June.

The 75-year-old has been head of world football’s governing body since 1998 but is being challenged by Asian confederation chief Mohamed Bin Hammam.

Blatter told a UEFA Congress today, March 22: “You know I aspire to another four years. [But] these will be the last years for which I stand as candidate.”

The new president will be elected at a FIFA Congress which starts on 31 May, with Qatari Bin Hammam vowing to increase FIFA’s decision-making power and spread its considerable wealth.

The presidential challenge is the first that Blatter has faced since Issa Hayatou took him on – and lost – in 2002.

Bin Hammam is also currently attending the Congress for European football’s governing body, UEFA, as the candidates lobby federation presidents for their vote on 1 June in Zurich, with UEFA’s 53 member countries representing more than a quarter of the 208 FIFA voters.

BBC’s Sports Editor, David Bond claimed: “This is a significant announcement.

“It’s the first time Blatter has said this in this campaign for [the next] presidential candidancy.

“Clearly it’s a message to UEFA president Michel Platini, who would like to take over from Blatter in 2015. Platini is crucial to both candidates.

“This might just help swing Platini’s support behind Blatter.”

Bin Hammam is likely to want eight years in office but has said he would be interested in cutting a deal with Platini to oust Blatter.

The winner needs a two-thirds majority of valid votes cast in the first ballot, or a majority in the second.

Blatter spoke of the upcoming elections: “We are in extra-time. Let’s wait and see what the outcome will be.”

Australian Football League (AFL) club St Kilda has announced Michael Nettlefold will step down as chief executive of the team.

Nettlefold, discount who has filled the position since 2009, sale sale will stay on until the Saints can find a suitable replacement.

“We have a number of major initiatives in place that are on the way to fruition,” he said.

“This meant a commitment for another long period and on reflection I felt the time was right for me to transition out of the position.”

During his time in charge, the Saints moved their training and administration base from Moorabbin to Seaford and hosted the first AFL game for points played overseas – in Wellington, NZ – this year.

They also played in the 2009-10 grand finals under Ross Lyon, before Lyon left to join Fremantle at the end of 2011 and the Saints replaced him with Scott Watters.

Since then, they have fallen to ninth last year and 16th this season, with just five wins.

Nettlefold played 43 games for the Saints between 1979-83 before ending his playing career with Fitzroy and later served as a Saints director for eight years.

His resignation comes after the recent election of a new president, Peter Summers.

Japanese sports equipment and apparel company, Mizuno has become a sponsor of Tokyo’s bid to host the 2020 Olympics and Paralympics.

The company joins Asics, Descente, JTB and Kinki Nippon Tourist as sponsors of the city’s bid for the games.

The former President of Mizuno, Masato Mizuno, is Chief Executive of the Tokyo 2020 bid.

Mizuno’s current President, Akito Mizuno, said Mizuno Corporation will share its experience to support the Bid Committee, and will do anything possible to help bring the 2020 Games to Tokyo.{jcomments on}

The UK government has said there are reasons for rejecting UK visa applications amid concerns in China about the number of rejections for visas to attend the Olympics.

At the opening of the London 2012 international media centre, pilule a journalist from Xinhua, anabolics a major Chinese news agency, store asked the Minister for Sport, Hugh Robertson, why Chinese ticket holders were being refused visas to enter the UK to attend The Games.

The topic is being widely debated in China and is trending on has become a hot topic in China, trending on Weibo (the Chinese equivalent of twitter).

It has been reported that some of the most respected Chinese citizens who had already bought tickets for London 2012 were finding their visa applications had been rejected and many of them did not know why.

Robertson said anybody’s visa application could be refused and each case needed to be looked at individually

“Anybody can be denied, but they are rejected for a reason…that can be investigated,” he said.

According to Home Office statistics, more than 10,000 Chinese nationals were refused UK visas in 2011. But 95 percent of 2011 Chinese applications, 205,000 people, were approved for a visa.

Of those applications, 90 percent were granted within eight working days.

“There has been no change in the rules for the Olympics, everything is the same and every application is considered on its merits,” a Home Office spokesman said.

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The British Olympic Association’s (BOA) cash problems are set to prevent them from staging one of the Olympic Movement’s most important and high-profile meetings in London next year.

The General Assembly of the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC), a bi-annual event, attended by more than 200 National Olympic Committees and held in conjunction with a meeting of the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) ruling Executive Board, was set to be held by the BOA just three months before the start of the Games in London.

However, the BOA are now set to inform the ANOC that they cannot afford the US$8m estimated that it would cost to host the event. With Athens and Beijing both having held the Assembly in 2004 and 2008 respectively, just a few months before they staged the Olympics and Paralympics, London was the obvious choice, but the 2012 event is now likely to be held in Mexico instead.

A spokesman for the BOA told insidethegames: “The final decision regarding the location for the 2012 ANOC Executive Board Meeting and General Assembly rests with the leadership of ANOC.

“We are fully committed and pleased to be doing our part to support them.”

But the BOA’s failure to be able to organise the General Assembly is another setback for the political ambitions of its chairman, Colin Moynihan, whose ambitions of becoming an IOC member have been hit by the row between the BOA and London 2012 over the surplus from next year’s Olympics, which has been referred to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).

After he rejected an offer from IOC President Jacques Rogge earlier this month to personally intervene and help broker a solution, Moynihan’s reputation is thought to have been marred within the body and reports suggest that his future at the BOA rests on the result of the case taken to the CAS.

The BOA is entitled to 20% of any surplus from the 2012 Games, however, there is disagreement over whether that should mean just the Olympics or also include the Paralympics.

Senior BOA National Olympic Committee members will table a no-confidence vote in Moynihan if the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) rules against it.

The BOA filed papers with CAS two weeks ago over its dispute with the London 2012 organising committee (LOCOG) and the hearing is likely to take place within the next four months.

The BOA is challenging an International Olympic Committee ruling that it should not be able to take its share of any profit from the 2012 Games until the Paralympics have also been taken into account.

The BOA’s National Olympic Committee (NOC) contains representatives from all of the Olympic sports and is responsible for electing the organisation’s chairman and has concerns that the BOA is spending money which it cannot afford, on a case which it is likely to lose.

The leader of one sport’s governing body told the BBC: “There is no way that CAS is going to go along with this.

“Moynihan’s position will be untenable if he loses. We have got to get the timing of the no-confidence motion right, but he can’t possibly survive if he sustains that amount of collateral damage.”

Another added: “Members of the NOC will have to ask themselves how the BOA got to this when we should all have been concentrating on winning gold medals.”

The BNP Paribas Open, doctor at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden, allergist will become the first tennis tournament in the history of the game to feature Hawkeye replay technology and video displays on more than three courts when all match courts are outfitted for next year’s event, search announced Steve Simon, tournament director.

While most tournaments feature Hawkeye replay technology and video displays on one, two or three courts, none have made it available on eight match courts. The tournament will also be upgrading their video displays throughout the grounds—the Stadium Plaza video display will showcase feeds from three match courts, the Village Court and the Garden Club displays will feature feeds from two match courts, and information towers will be located at all three entrances and next to the practice courts, making it possible for fans to stay in touch with the action even when they are away from the courts.

“This is a great addition to the BNP Paribas Open, and one that I am sure all players on the ATP World Tour will be excited about,” said top-ranked American Andy Roddick. “Hawkeye is one of the best advancements in the game in recent years, so making it available on all courts will create consistency, and is something we hope more tournaments embrace in the future.”

“Hawkeye is an important officiating tool and greatly enhances the tennis experience for fans and players,” said Adam Helfant, ATP executive chairman and president. “We think it’s fantastic that the BNP Paribas Open has made this commitment to bring Hawkeye to all eight match courts and look forward to seeing it in March.”

The International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) informed on Monday that the bid process for the 16th World Gymnaestrada in 2019 has been launched.

The 131 FIG affiliated and associated national federations have been invited to submit their applications to the FIG Office by December 15, doctor 2012. The host city will be determined at the 13th FIG Council meeting in Liverpool (GBR) in May 2013, tadalafil where the 2019 World Gymnaestrada Bid Federations will have an opportunity to present their bids to the FIG authorities.

All candidate cities will be visited by a delegation of the FIG Gymnastics for All Committee in January – February 2013 and will be evaluated on venue and other bid content.