Cost to Travel to Bejing?

They don't need to fly business class. I just went to expedia and found flights starting at $1500.

Now check out lodging and meals. You will have no trouble getting to 5 grand.

It costs between $5k-$10k to get to Beijing.

$1500 to get to Beijing.

What an ass wipe. If it wasn't obvious to you that I was eijing and all that goes with it, I apologize for your lack of intelect.

Well, I do think it's unfortunate that family members can't afford to go. That's certainly a sad situation, but that could get extremely costly in the end.

I'm assuming there is no arrangement that allows one family member to travel with the athlete? I actually don't know much on this subject, but it would seem that that would be a pretty logical request!

What an ass wipe. If it wasn't obvious to you that I was eijing and all that goes with it, I apologize for your lack of intelect.

This isn't a question of "intellect", rather one writing. You wrote that it would cost as much as $10,000 to "to get to Beijing," mentioning nothing about accomodations. In the aforementioned article, Katie Thomas wrote, "the price of attending them this August may be $5000 to $10,000 a person." There is little doubt as to what she means, though I question her math:

Food shouldn't be a problem, for any parent of most of the athletes. They could eat two meals daily at a hospitality suite and spend a little on dinner at the stadium/arena or elsewhere.

Housing is certanly the biggest issue. I'm sure few parents independently planned ahead to reserve accomodations, but managers and sponsors (good ones) will have some rooms for friends of the family but not many. I think that your average double occupancy room in Beijing is starting around $600/night (I found one on hotels.com for $465 that looked reasonable).

If you assume that you'll be there for six nights, an adult sharing a room would pay:

$1500 for the ticket

$1800 for the shared hotel

$600 for daily expenses

------

$3900

Mind you, there are hotels listed at less than $300/night, which would drop the per adult rate to $3000.

Hospitality Suite??? This is not the New York Marathon. IT IS THE OLYMPICS. Family members are not welcome to the athlete village any longer. I am a personal coach and it is costing my wife and I $1900 each for plane ticket. It is also costing us $800 bucks a night for our hotel based on double occupancy. We will easily spend $10,000 for the 2 of us for a week. It is safe to say that the mobile clown is not going to Beijing.

Personal coaches get totally dumped on by American distance runners. If a pro runner doesn't pay their coach some kind of salary, he/she (especially if there are a couple athletes) should reward their coach with cash for the trip for coach and spouse!

I don't feel that way. I receive 10% of everything. The athletes that don't pay coaches are taking the coach for granted and that sucks. That is not me. However, I knew athletes that always justified not paying their coach because their coach was already making a good living. That is horse shit. I don't care if your coach is a billionaire you should still pay him.

In 1996 as a young grad student, I went to the Atlanta games. Camped every night on a nice lake north of ATL. Met a German guy who had been to every games since 1952. He said he camped at every one of them. He's not a "granola" guy either. Just thought it was the simplest way and cheapest way to do it.

There has to be some level of housing -- or camping -- cheaper than $800 a night.

Reebok, adidas, Nike, etc, will all have hospitality suites open to their athletes and their families.

I don't know if the hospitality suites are different at the Olympics than at the trials. The trials suites are simply finger food. Never a substantial meal.

Adidas obviously doesn't. I remember the thread about donations for Tim Broe's Mom and brother needing cash to go to Athens. I would take a second mortgage on the house before I missed my kid in the Olympics.