Borjomi and Bakuriani resorts official candidates for hosting 2025 European Youth Olympic Winter Festival
Bakuriani has hosted international winter sport competitions including the FIS Ski Cross competition in 2018. Photo: Nino Alavidze/agenda.ge.
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Georgia's resort towns of Borjomi and Bakuriani have been officially selected as candidates for hosting the 2025 European Youth Olympic Winter Festival.
The European Olympic Committees, the organising body of the sporting event, confirmed the selection to the Georgian National Olympic Committee this week. EOC president Janez Kocijančič and secretary general Raffaele Pagnozzi sent a letter to GNOC president Leri Khabelov as the confirmation of the candidate status for the winter resort locations.
The GNOC submitted the candidacy of Borjomi and Bakuriani to the European body in summer this year. The latter location is already set to host the 2023 Freestyle Ski and Snowboard World Championships after winning the bid last year.
An evaluation commission for the 2025 sporting event will visit the two towns in February, with the winning candidate set to be revealed at a general assembly of the EOC in November 2020.
This year's winter edition of the European Youth Olympic Festival was held in Sarajevo. Photo via European Olympic Committees.
The Georgian organisation will also look to strengthen its bid with its successful hosting of the 2015 European Youth Summer Olympic Festival in Tbilisi, where competitions were held at 11 venues across the city for athletes from 37 nations.
The nomination is a further boost to Borjomi and Bakuriani, with the former town subject of a 2018-announced state project for transforming it into a "museum city". Located about 160km west of capital Tbilisi, the town has served as a resort destination since visits by 19th century Russian Imperial nobility.
Beside residences for the high-profile guests in the Tsarist era the town also features a vintage narrow-gauge railway passing over its picturesque natural landscape - and connecting it to Bakuriani - as well as industrial production facilities.
Bakuriani, one of the most popular ski resorts in the country, recently added new ski lifts to its infrastructure ahead of the 2020 season, with further updates to its lift- and gondola infrastructure throughout this year.
This year's Olympic Festivals were held in Baku for the summer edition and Sarajevo in the winter season.
Three new ski lifts will be added to the ski resort town of Bakuriani starting in the 2020 winter season, which will open up new ski areas.
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Georgia’s winter resort Bakuriani is bidding to host the 2023 Freestyle Ski and Snowboard World Championships.
New life is returning to a historic narrow gauge railway line that transports passengers via two small trains through the mountains between Borjomi in central Georgia to nearby Bakuriani winter resort.
The Evaluation Commission of European Olympic Committee has visited Georgia’s mountainous resort Bakuriani today in order to evaluate its resources for hosting the 2025 Winter Youth Olympic Games.