London, November 2009

ATOS ORIGIN TECHNOLOGY TEAM CELEBRATES 1.000 DAYS TO THE LONDON 2012 OLYMPIC GAMES

To mark 1,000 days until the London 2012 Olympic Games, Atos Origin – Worldwide IT Partner for the Olympic Games – tonight with the British Olympic Association will host the Olympic Gold Ball at the Natural History Museum.

Olympians including gold medallists Matthew Pinsent (rowing), Jayne Torvill (ice dancing), Tim Brabants (canoeing), Denise Lewis (athletics) and Sarah Webb (sailing), will attend the Ball, at which  Atos Origin and the BOA will release statistics to show what the next 1000 days holds for the athletes and the technology team.

Did you know?

• Open water World Swimming Champion Keri-Anne Payne will swim the equivalent of 2.5 times the circumference of the earth in training between now and 2012
• Atos Origin delivers the results and athlete information at the Olympic Games to the world’s media in 0.3 seconds
• The 10m diving board, used by current World Diving Champion, Tom Daley, is equivalent in height to two double-decker buses and a car balanced on top of each other
• Atos Origin has been the Worldwide IT Partner for the Olympic Games since Salt Lake City in 2002
• If you total the number of clearances of Olympic Athletics Silver Medallist Germaine Mason's personal best in competitive high jumps between now and 2012, he will jump the height of One Churchill Place, London 2012 Headquarters
• Five deliveries every minute will be made during the busiest phase of the construction project as the London 2012 Olympic Park. Atos Origin consultants have developed a solution that enables deliveries to be managed which minimises congestion and improves reliability and security
• Up to now, Olympic Gymnastics Bronze Medallist Louis Smith has completed over 900,000 rotations of the Pommel Horse over the 12 years of his career - over ten days supporting himself on his arms
• A portal developed by Atos Origin will help London 2012 recruit up to 70,000 volunteers for Games time
• You would have to watch 10,000 episodes of Eastenders between now and 2012 to equate to the time World Athletics Champion Phillips Idowu will spend training to see if he can go one better than the silver medal he won in Beijing
• Under the direction of LOCOG’s Technology Department, Atos Origin, the lead integrator, will work with its fellow technology partners conducting more than 200,000 hours of testing to ensure the systems used at the Olympic Games deliver a gold winning performance
• Atos Origin is the Worldwide IT Partner for the Olympic Games. This contract is the largest sports related information technology contract ever awarded
• During the London 2012 Olympic Games around 10,500 athletes representing 205 countries will compete in 26 sports in 34 competitions venues for 3,000 medal events, watched by over 20,000 media and broadcasters.

The Olympic Gold Ball is an annual event that raises money to enable the British Olympic Association to continue to provide world class services to athletes and help prepare Team GB for future success at the Olympic Games.

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For further media information or rights free images from the BOA Olympic Gold Ball, please contact Kate Silvers or Abigail Thomas at Fast Track:
07789 544048 / kate.silvers@fasttrackagency.com
07841 012675 / abigail.thomas@fasttrackagency.com