The Smiggin Holes 2010 Winter Olympic bid was a joke campaign initiated by Australian comedians Roy and HG to bring the

2010 Winter Olympics )'' , nations = 82 , athletes = 2,626 , events = 86 in 7 sports (15 disciplines) , opening = February 12, 2010 , closing = February 28, 2010 , opened_by = Governor General Michaëlle Jean , cauldron = Catriona Le May DoanNancy GreeneWayne Gret ...

to the tiny and little-known village of

Smiggin Holes Smiggin Holes is a village in the ski resort area of Snowy Mountains of New South Wales, Australia, in the Snowy Monaro Regional Council. It is primarily a winter-only resort village. It is within the Kosciuszko National Park, and is adminis ...

, part of the

Perisher Blue Perisher Ski Resort (known as Perisher Blue until 2009) is the largest ski resort in the Southern Hemisphere. Located in the Australian Snowy Mountains, the resort is an amalgamation of four villages ( Perisher Valley, Smiggin Holes, Guthega, ...

ski resort, in

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...

, Australia. The bid was first proposed on the television show '' The Ice Dream'', which aired as part of the

Seven Network The Seven Network (commonly known as Channel Seven or simply Seven) is a major Australian commercial free-to-air television network. It is owned by Seven West Media Limited, and is one of five main free-to-air television networks in Australia ...

's coverage of the

2002 Winter Olympics The 2002 Winter Olympics, officially the XIX Olympic Winter Games and commonly known as Salt Lake 2002 ( arp, Niico'ooowu' 2002; Gosiute Shoshoni: ''Tit'-so-pi 2002''; nv, Sooléí 2002; Shoshoni: ''Soónkahni 2002''), was an internation ...

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City (often shortened to Salt Lake and abbreviated as SLC) is the capital and most populous city of Utah, United States. It is the seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in Utah. With a population of 200,133 in 2020, th ...

Overview

During the course of ''The Ice Dreams broadcast, a number of suggestions were presented by the hosts to the audience in order to make the holding of the Winter Games possible at Smiggin. For example, in order to provide a tall enough mountain for skiing events, Roy and HG proposed that either

Mount Kosciuszko Mount Kosciuszko ( ; Ngarigo: , ), previously spelled Mount Kosciusko, is mainland Australia's tallest mountain, at 2,228 metres (7,310 ft) above sea level. It is located on the Main Range of the Snowy Mountains in Kosciuszko National ...

be raised 300 metres (from its current height of 2,228 metres), or that a new mountain be built in Smiggin itself, which would be named Mount Steggall, after Australian

Nagano Nagano may refer to: Places * Nagano Prefecture, a prefecture in Japan ** Nagano (city), the capital city of the same prefecture *** Nagano 1998, the 1998 Winter Olympics *** Nagano Olympic Stadium, a baseball stadium in Nagano *** Nagano Universi ...

slalom bronze medalist

Zali Steggall Zali Steggall (born 16 April 1974) is an Australian politician, lawyer and former Olympic athlete. She has been independent member for Warringah since the 2019 Australian federal election when she defeated the incumbent, former Prime Minister ...

. "We've just got to get the nation to dump all its rubbish on top of Kosciuszko, compact it a bit and voila, Mount Steggall." In addition, the duo suggested that the caravan park could be used as the athletes' village, and local portable toilet business Dougie Does Dunnies promised the cleanest Olympic Games ever as far as toilets were concerned. The

Cooma Cooma is a town in the south of New South Wales, Australia. It is located south of the national capital, Canberra, via the Monaro Highway. It is also on the Snowy Mountains Highway, connecting Bega with the Riverina. At the , Cooma had a ...

KFC would provide catering for the event. The duo also suggested that the

Biathlon The biathlon is a winter sport that combines cross-country skiing and rifle shooting. It is treated as a race, with contestants skiing through a cross-country trail whose distance is divided into shooting rounds. The shooting rounds are not time ...

would "have live targets, something that will make a noise when it's hit". Roy also said that "we can have a kangaroo cull. God we're going to have fun." Mottos for the Smiggin Holes 2010 bid included "Unleash the Mighty Mongrel of the Holes", "Winter Wonder Down Under" and "If you've got the poles, we've got the holes." Appearing on ''The Ice Dream'',

International Olympic Committee The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swiss ...

president

Jacques Rogge Jacques Jean Marie Rogge, Count Rogge (, ; 2 May 1942 – 29 August 2021) was a Belgian sports administrator and physician who served as the eighth President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) from 2001 to 2013. In 2013, Rogge bec ...

described the bid film as "very impressive".

Smiggin Holes 2014 bid

After the disappointment of being pushed out by

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

for 2010, HG Nelson stated in a June 2009 podcast that "I think 2014 is not beyond us, and we're still marking it under the slogan, 'If you've got the poles, we've got the holes.'" Sochi has since hosted the 2014 Winter Games.

References

{{reflist

External links

Olympics 2010: On to Smiggin Holes! - TIME.com

"Unleash the Mighty Mongrel" by Sean Peter, The Official Anthem of the 2010 Bid

The Life with Roy & HG - Podcast 65
2010 Winter Olympics Sport in New South Wales Hoaxes in Australia 2002 in Australian sport 2002 hoaxes Australia at the Olympics