Australia is on the cusp of landing hosting rights for the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games in a move that has sparked calls for a "significant injection of funds" to support a generation of emerging gold medal hopefuls.
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Brisbane, and the state of Queensland, was installed as the preferred bidder by the International Olympic Committee at an executive meeting.
The IOC will now deal exclusively with the Brisbane bid with officials to go through a list of formalities before a host city is announced, possibly before Tokyo's rescheduled Games begin in July.
Now marathon great Rob de Castella has called for a "critical" redirection of funding into pathways for emerging athletes to give Australia its best chance for success.
Australian athletes had already been guaranteed more than $115 million in extra AIS funding to prepare for major international events for the 2021-22 financial year.
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But de Castella wants to see AIS chiefs work with national sporting organisations to "lay the foundation stones" for Australian sport's future.
He also hopes the bid can revitalise the AIS' Bruce campus, which some have lamented as a ghost town in recent years, and nurture talent identification programs and high performance skill coaching.
"There will need to be a significant injection of funds," de Castella said.
"At the moment we're supporting the national senior athletes. Now we've got to have a whole new program to support those emerging elite athletes, and we've got to fund them over the next 10 to 11 years.
"The funding to sport, a lot of the funding currently goes to the senior athletes, the national teams for overseas competitions and head coaches.
"But now there is an opportunity really to identify and put resources into laying the foundation stones for these emerging elite athletes, and that's absolutely critical.
"The success for any elite athlete is really laid in that age group from 13, 14, through to 20.
"Now, if we're successful, work has to start straight away in terms of identifying those squads and those athletes that hopefully will be marching behind the Australian flag at the opening ceremony of the Games.
"That's a role the AIS really needs to play for all of the national sporting organisations, all of the state institutes and academies."
Brisbane's emergence as the favourite to host the 2032 Games is a momentous moment for Australian sport, and one which could see the Queensland capital become the third Australian city to host the event after Melbourne and Sydney.
Australian Olympic Committee president John Coates has said the Games would break even with an operating cost of $4.5 billion countered by IOC funding [$2.5b], sponsorships [$1b] and ticketing [$1b].
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