Athletes and coaches will have active voice in the organization of the first Brazilian edition of the Olympic Games. This Wednesday 20th, president of the Rio 2016 Games Organizing Committee, Carlos Arthur Nuzman, announced the creation of the Sports Advisory Commission, during the closing of the first official visit of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Coordination Commission to Rio de Janeiro. “We are following the example of London 2012, which has advisors in the sports field representing the civil society. The first names were already defined: Bernardinho, Joaquim Cruz, Ricardo Prado, Adriana Samuel, Gustavo Kuerten e Maurren Maggi. They have experience and will advise us mostly in areas such as sports facilities and the Olympic Village. The group is still to get bigger and will also have Paralympics’ athletes”, explained Carlos Arthur Nuzman. After three days of meetings and visits to the sports facilities, IOC Coordination Commission president, Nawal el Moutawael, praised the work done by Rio de Janeiro in the last seven months. “I’m happy to see that the project starts to take shape. We heard the Organizing Committee and the three levels of government, and to summarize the last days, I can say that Rio de Janeiro had a good start. It was good to see that the government support remains solid and that the 26 sports have their venues for competitions guaranteed. There is still a lot of work to be done, but we are confident”, said Nawal. Making a balance of the IOC Commission visit, Rio 2016 Committee president recalled that the city’s Bidding Dossier reinforced the utilization and revitalization of the Docks zone, and listed a few facilities that can be built there, such as part of the Media Village, the Non-credentialed Media Center, the Technology Center, the Operations Center, the Credential Center for Work Force and Volunteers, the Center for Distribution of Uniforms and the Logistic Center. THE IOC COORDINATION COMMISSION – In all Olympic Games editions the IOC creates a Coordination Commission that pays periodic visits to the hosting city with the aim of helping the Organizing Committee and monitors the development of the project. The group assigned to the Rio 2016 Games was formed in January this year and, the same month, the president and executive director Gilbert Felli (SUI) were in Rio de Janeiro. First woman to lead an IOC Coordination Commission, Nawal was also the first African woman to become an Olympic champion, winning the 400m hurdles at the Los Angeles 84 Games. The Coordination Commission has members of the five continents, all with previous experiences in Evaluation Commission or Olympic Games Coordination or Organizing Committees of the greatest sports event in the planet. The group represents various units of the Olympic Movement, as athletes, National Olympic Committees and International Federations, which guarantees the necessary success of the event. Besides Nawal El Moutawakel and Gilbert Felli, also making part of the group are Alex Gilady (ISR), Alexander Popov (RUS), Beatrice Allen (GAM), Ching-Kuo Wu (TPE), Francesco Ricci Bitti (ITA), Greg Hartung (AUS), Gunilla Lindberg (SUE), John D. Coates (AUS), Julio César Maglione (URU), Nat Indrapana (TAI), Nicole Hoevertsz (ARU), Patrick Joseph Hickey (IRL), Richard L. Carrión (PUR), Sergey Bubka (UKR), Timothy Tsun Ting Fok (HKG) e Willi Kaltschmitt Luján (GUA). After the IOC Coordinating Commission visit, the International Paralympics Committee (IPC) Orientation Seminar will take place, to discuss the challenges and organizing operations for the Rio 2016 Paralympics Games. IPC Executive director, Xavier Gonzalez, and Paralympics Games senior manager, Thanos Kostopoulos will be present.