DENVER (AP) – At least 70 percent of U.S. Olympic sports organizations have applied for government funds during the coronavirus pandemic, a stark financial reality that underscores the frailties within the world’s most dominant Olympic sports system.
The Associated Press surveyed 44 of the country’s national governing bodies (NGBs) – the organizations charged with operating programs from the grassroots through the Olympic levels in sports that run the gamut from badminton to basketball.
All but four of the 36 NGBs that responded said they had applied for assistance from the Paycheck Protection Program. Not all the organizations revealed how much they received, but those who did have been approved for a cumulative total of about $12 million.
Beginning next July, when the delayed Summer Olympics are scheduled to start, U.S. NGBs will send a total of around 1,150 athletes to two Olympics and two Paralympics over the span of seven months. While Mikaela Shiffrin, Noah Lyles and the U.S. basketball teams are on solid financial footing because of their star power and marketability, the U.S. will depend on dozens of lesser-known athletes to dominate the medals table in Tokyo and at the Winter Games in Beijing. It puts the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee and the NGBs on an urgent track to fund all the potential medalists, many of whom haven’t been able to train properly for months.
“There’s a very, very real and dire financial situation in sport,” said Sarah Hirshland, the CEO of the USOPC, which oversees the NGBs. “And certainly, the sports organizations we work with closely are feeling revenue pain. And it’s immediate.”