INQUIRER Sports

VANCOUVER-- Canada is entering the final countdown before the 2010 Winter Olympics by applying the finishing touches to facilities and sending the flame farther north this week than ever before.

With just 12 weeks to go before the opening ceremony, Vancouver organizers say they have completed the main venues and sold the majority of the tickets.

The 45,000 kilometre (27,968 mile) torch relay is now underway as the Olympic flame travelled farther north Sunday than it has ever gone, reaching the Canadian weather and military outpost of Alert, Nunavut.

There 20 torchbearers, dubbed the Frozen Chosen, helped light up the Artic sky as part of what will be longest relay in Olympics history by the time it arrives for the start of the February 12-28 Games.

The lighting of the Olympic cauldron in Vancouver will crown six years of planning for the organising committee, VANOC.

The new and refurbished venues are framed by breathtaking mountain backdrops, especially in the ski resort of Whistler.

But they have not come without some major financial headaches.

Prince Charles and his wife, Camilla the Duchess of Cornwall, visited one of the new facilities on Saturday when they toured the one billion dollar Vancouver athletes' village as part of their 11-day Canadian tour.

The 17-acre village was one of the final Olympic facilities to be completed and it ran into financial trouble last year when the American financial backers pulled out citing the economic crisis.

Additional financing had to be secured for the village which will be turned over to the city after the Games and the units sold as apartments.

Canada also has a 37 million dollar shortfall in its budget, but International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge said two months ago that he is confident the Vancouver Games would break even.

Organizers got into difficulties because of the recession and in September the IOC agreed to step in and give VANOC an undisclosed amount to cover a major portion of the budget shortfall.

The IOC's unprecedented financial package came after the IOC was unable to come up with the 11 international sponsors it had promised.

They were only able to secure nine financial sponsors but Rogge says those nine still pledged 883 million dollars compared to the 830 million dollars in sponsorship for the Beijing Games.

The crown jewel of the venues is the speedskating oval in the suburb of Richmond which is large enough to hold four 747 airplanes.

Hockey, figure skating, speedskating and even curling are some of the toughest tickets to get but buying tickets to lesser events like luge have proved to be an ongoing challenge as well.

A computer glitch on Saturday delayed the sale of the final batch of tickets as people were unable to purchase online because of technical problems with the website.
Those lucky enough to get tickets are hoping to see the world's best winter athletes who will compete in 15 sports over 17 days.

Included in that number are some former champions, trying to stage dramatic comebacks.
Figure skaters Sasha Cohen of the US, Russian Evgeni Plushenko and China's Shen Xue and Zhao Hongbo are training again after long periods of time off.
Plushenko is the reigning champion and Cohen won the silver in women's at the 2006 Turin Olympics. Pairs skaters Shen and Zhao took bronze in Italy.

Outdoor events will be at the mercy of the weather and forecasters are predicting a severe El Nino in February. Because of its mild winter climate, snow isn't a common site in downtown Vancouver in a normal winter.

Fog could also be a factor in places like Whistler which was dropped from the Alpine World Cup circuit several years ago because of bad weather.

The Richmond oval will also be the site of the anti-doping facilities. The lab is almost identical to the World Anti-Doping Agency lab in Montreal.

Officials plan to conduct 2,000 tests which would be close to double the number of blood and urine samples taken at 2006 Turin Olympics.

While many Vancouverites say they are heading out of town during the Games to escape the crowds those that hope to take in the action are being asked to leave their cars at home and join the visitors on public transit.

The only venue that will have public parking is the University of British Columbia ice hockey rink, the site of some of the preliminary hockey games.

Organizers say they have added extra public buses, but it remains to be seen how Vancouver's tiny rapid transit trains (SkyTrain) and its often dysfunctional public bus system will handle Olympic-size crowds.