By Yoon Chul
Staff reporter
The 2018 PyeongChang Olympics bidding committee organized Tuesday a special panel of current athletes, in a bid to promote its campaign to host the Winter Olympics in eight years.
At its launching ceremony at Seoul's Olympic Park, a total of 24 Korean winter sports stars were designated as members, which include gold medalists at the Vancouver Games such as figure skating queen Kim Yu-na and the speed skating trio of Mo Tae-bum, Lee Seung-hoon and Lee Sang-hwa.
``It's an honor for me to be a committee member,'' Kim said. ``I will give my best efforts to help PyeongChang host the Winter Olympics.''
Those athletes are expected to add a great contribution to PyeongChang's third bid as advisors to make the small city in Gangwon Privince a better and more convenient venue for the sports festival.
``We expect this special committee to help our campaign by promoting reasons the 2018 event should be held in PyeongChang,'' said Cho Yang-ho, co-chairman of the bidding committee.
Cho also said that the committee will try to make the best use of the members.
``This time we have more star players, and it will be more efficient in persuading IOC members into voting for South Korea,'' he added. ``We have plans to make the athletes make presentations for PyeongChang in various events.''
During its previous bid for the 2014 Olympics, advice from athletes was ``really helpful,'' co-chairman Kim Sun-jin said.
At the ceremony, the Vancouver stars spoke out their opinions on PyeongChang's bidding campaign. Figure skating sensation Kim Yu-na said the city could benefit from raising the quality of the ice for skating events.
``It might be tough to control the quality of ice if figure and short track skaters share the same ice rinks, as in Turin and Vancouver. I hope to see better quality of ice because it is for the Olympics,'' she said.
The first Korean gold medalist in figure skating also spoke of her plan to promote PyeongChang through the sport.
``When I perform in ice shows I meet many world top-class skaters. I will ask them to help the Korean Olympic bid,'' Kim Yu-na said.
Other athlete members reiterated their plan with the committee. ``The best thing I can do is put on good performances in international competitions, and that's what I will try to do the most,'' Lee Sung-hoon said.
PycongChang submitted its application to host the 2018 Olympics to the IOC in March. Official activities for the bidding campaign start at the end of June for candidate cities.
The host city for the 2018 Winter Olympics will be decided on July 6, 2011, during the IOC assembly in Durban, South Africa. Along with PyeongChang, Munich of Germany and Annecy of France are named as favorites.