The Zika virus, fears athletes will be mugged on their way to the stadium, the state of Guanabara Bay and the not so unusual gripes accommodations aren't up to par and some facilities are not as finished as they should have been are just some of the hot topics fuelling online commentary and debate.

Then there is the ongoing controversy over apparently state-sanctioned doping by Russia that has seen many of that nation's athletes denied permission to compete.

Given all of the above, a casual observer could be excused for concluding the games are no more than a high value trophy in an international contest for kudos and prestige where success usually goes to either the best chemists or the highest bidders.

This is to miss the point entirely. The Olympics, as our recent report on Canberra swimmer, Ben Treffers, demonstrated, are actually about the determination of a highly gifted international cohort of young men and women who have given their lives to the pursuit of an almost impossible dream.

The vast majority of these say no to drugs in any form and despise the drug cheats who devalue the achievements of others while bringing individual sports and the games themselves into disrepute.

The athletes are the people the stadiums and other facilities are built for; they are the individuals the crowds flock to the host nation to watch and, most importantly, it is their grit and determination that creates the drama and the spectacle that sets the Olympics apart as a celebration of humans trying to be the best they can be.

Treffers, like tens of thousands of other athletes around the world, did not succeed in achieving his dream. The Commonwealth Games gold medallist failed in his bid for selection for the Australian swim team for Rio in April.

He was gutted, and quite understandably so. The 24-year-old has given more than half his life to developing his talent and when you are that good the Olympics are where you want to peak.

It's not just about the gold medallists and the acclamation of the crowd. Wherever there are winners there always losers and those who don't come first have usually trained just as long and just as hard as those who come home a few fractions of a second ahead.

As competitors they all have one thing in common; that willingness to put themselves on the line against the best the world has to offer. That is the true Olympic spirit.

It is the purity of this vision that will, over the next few weeks, ignite a passion for sport and the possibility of Olympic glory in the hearts of hundreds of thousands of children in Australia and across the world.

On a pragmatic level this is commendable because of the community health benefits. But, even more importantly, it is a reminder we should never be afraid to dream the impossible dreams.