Tradition obliges, the Olympic flame will begin its journey well before the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics on July 26, 2024. Lit in Olympia, Greece, it will arrive by sea in Marseille on May 8, 2024, before crossing the country. . The organizing committee (Cojo) lifted the veil on Tuesday on part of the planned device. Nearly 10,000 torchbearers will thus be called upon in 54 metropolitan departments and five overseas territories.
The relay, whose exact route will be revealed on June 23 at La Sorbonne, will be able to count on two “captains” of choice: Laure and Florent Manaudou. Both, Olympic gold medalists (2004 for Laure, 2012 for Florent), will be sort of “super ambassadors”, called upon to mobilize the population and intervene in major actions organized around this relay. Dimitri Pavadé (para-athletics) and Mona Francis (paratriathlon) will also be at their side.
Three main “families” of wearers
New for this French edition, the collective relay: a group of 24 people, including a single bearer, can participate, to represent, for example, a sports federation. They will be 3,000 collectively and 7,000 individually, including people with disabilities, and gender parity, from the age of 15. Each torchbearer will carry the flame for about 4 minutes over a distance of 200 meters.
These thousands of carriers will come from three major families, as explained by the Cojo: the “sport” family (anonymous and great champions), the “territorial energy” family (great chefs, craftsmen, personalities with a particular know-how…) and the family “committed people” (in education, the environment, integration…). They will be appointed directly by the organization, appointed by a peer, selected by the commercial partners or the participating local authorities.
Who will be the last carrier?
Paris 2024, on the other hand, said nothing on Tuesday about the identity of the last bearer of the flame or the place of final ignition. “The Eiffel Tower is not stopped as the place to light the cauldron”, simply specified the boss of the Games, Tony Estanguet.
Asked about the security around the relay, the Cojo explained that there would be “a traveling bubble” around the flame provided by the State (gendarmerie, police), to which local security forces will be added in each territory. additional.
The Paralympic Games torch relay, which will arrive on August 28 in Paris, for the opening of the Paralympic Games, will include 1,000 torchbearers, and will be shorter.