On September 7th 2013, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced to the world that Tokyo would be the host for the 2020 Olympic Games, much to the sorrow of Madrid and Istanbul. It certainly wasn’t the most competitive candidate pool in recent years; Spain was in severe economic recession and boasted a 27% unemployment rate, while Istanbul’s reputation was tarnished somewhat due to a mixture of anti-government protests back in June, the bloody Syrian civil war, as well as a string of doping scandals among Turkish athletes.
