Going for gold (in every event)
Low television ratings worldwide and empty seats in the stadiums led media critics to write off the recent Turin Winter Olympics as something of a flop.
But commentators have no such fears for Beijing's Summer Olympics in 2008.
Their prediction is that, far from losing their lustre, the first Games in China will be a blazing success, bringing fans in their thousands to Beijing from all over the world.
No less an authority than Peter Ueberroth, the US Olympic Committee chairman, summed it up this way: 'The 2008 Olympics will be one of the most significant events for our generation - not only athletically but culturally, socially and economically as well. It is an opportunity for China to demonstrate to the world its progress and influence in areas that transcend athletics.'
Al Neuharth, founder of the mass-circulation newspaper USA Today, recently predicted that the 2008 Olympics could well be a big winner, setting records for attendance, worldwide interest and TV viewing.
And he reckons that, far from being the usual two-way race between the United States and Russia for the most medals, the Beijing Olympics will be a tight, three-way contest, with China the other contender. In Athens in 2004, China placed third after the United States and Russia, with 63 medals - 32 of them gold.
For China's 1.3 billion people, these showcase Olympics promise to be a matter of intense national pride. With the eyes and ears of the world on Beijing, Chinese people will get to know sports fans from all over the world.
They will also introduce China to the wider world via television. And the thousands of foreigners thronging the stands will get a glimpse of how the nation is emerging as an economic power.
But there will be no needless extravagance. 'An economical Games' has become an organisers' objective: they are keenly aware that the country still has many people living below the poverty line, especially in the countryside.
China's economy leapfrogged Britain's in January, becoming the fourth largest in the world. The proverbial 'sleeping dragon' is set to surpass even the United States as the biggest exporter by the end of the decade.
The mainland is expected to maintain for some time its rapid economic growth of the past two decades.
In many areas today, it is reaching new economic heights: there are some 1.3 million cars in Beijing, which is home to 11 million people. Half the world's production of concrete and one-third of the steel output is being consumed in the mainland building boom. In 2003, China's total imports were about US$350 billion - 9 per cent of it from the US - while exports were some US$440 billion (22 per cent to the US). Direct investment in 2004 stood at US$60 billion.
So, yet another Chinese civilisation is rising through a modern economic and hi-tech miracle. The Chinese dragon, while politically communist, is being steadily transformed from a command-control economy to free-enterprise capitalism. It is already about 70 per cent privatised.
Finally, it will be extraordinarily easy for Olympic visitors to keep in touch with home: China is the world's largest mobile phone market, with more than 380 million handsets.
Some 100 million Chinese are online, second only to US internet users.
With such progress, everything should be in place for visitors from all over the world to enjoy the Games - and to enjoy China, too. Can the nation pull it off?
Lionel Walsh is a freelance journalist based in France and a former Reuters foreign correspondent
