Today’s the day: on Wednesday Beijing will submit its final application to host the 2022 Winter Olympics. It’s the last active part of the bid process. After this, an Olympic inspection team will visit Beijing in March (expect clear skies), before the International Olympic Committee (IOC) makes a final decision on July 31.

Initially a six-city race, with every European candidate city dropping out, Beijing (and bid partner city Zhangjiakou) now faces only Kazakhstan’s Almaty, and was said to be the clear favorite in a possible slip of the tongue by International International Ice Hockey Federation President René Fasel on Monday.

The application apparently asks 192 questions and requires a further 154 separate financial and security guarantees.

If selected, Beijing would become the first city ever to host both the Summer and Winter Games. Beijing will host of all the Games’ events that take place on ice, and Zhangjiakou, about 200 kilometers away in Hebei province, will host the snow events. Which is good considering Beijing received about two flakes of snow during the winter of 2013-2014, a fact that doesn’t seem to have hurt the city’s chances at all.

Unlike the strong and sustained support that Beijing’s bid has enjoyed from government and the public, even Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev has wavered regarding Almaty’s bid, and has announced that it too will be a two-city event, adding Kazakhstan’s capital city, Astana, into the mix.

Photos: Wikipedia