Lake District in major Olympic push (From The Westmorland Gazette)

Lake District in major Olympic push

8:50am Friday 13th March 2009

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THE Lake District’s greatest natural asset - its landscape - is being harnessed in a major push to attract 2012 Olympic teams to set up training camps in the region.

Tourism, regeneration and local authority officials are planning a concerted bid to sell Cumbria’s fells and lakes to international squads looking for suitable locations to prepare for the London games.

They want to persuade the London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games that the Lake District landscape will be an ideal training environment for sports such as open-water swimming, sailing, mountain biking and long-distance running.

The bid is being spearheaded by Adventure Capital, the outdoor promotions arm of Cumbria Tourism.

Project manager Andrea Runkee said the aim was to have Lake District locations affiliated to the three officially-designated Olympic training sites already established in Cumbria - Kendal’s The Dojo judo centre, The Hoop basketball centre in Barrow and the Sheepmount athletics track in Carlisle.

Cumbria 2012 Steering Group is already heavily promoting these camps and other Olympic spin-offs, but pushing the landscape potential is still at an early stage.

For more on this story see today's Westmorland Gazette.

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