Tom Cruise descending from the roof of the Stade de France, a golden traveler from the future and the pitch turned into a giant party hall. Paris treated itself to an emotional celebration to bid farewell to the Olympic Games, celebrating its beauty before passing the baton to Los Angeles.
The Lion King Games
The famous song “Sous le ciel de Paris” was playing, in the intimate voice of the young Frenchwoman Zaho de Sagazan, when the French hero of Paris-2024, Leon Marchand, appeared in the Tuileries Garden.
Winner of four individual gold medals in Paris, the 22-year-old swimmer was in charge of putting out the cauldron and marking the end of these Games, which have also been his.
The flame had arrived here in the rain on 26 July, carried by former athlete Marie-Jose Perec and judoka Teddy Riner, and from here it was taken to the Stade de France, where more than 71,000 spectators were waiting.
Party on the dance floor
Meanwhile, the track was filled with athletes who came to celebrate that everything was over, that the endless hours of training, uncertainties and falls had at least brought them here. Some showed off their medals, others simply wanted to celebrate that it had been worth it.
French classics such as “Freed from Desire” and “We’re the Champions” were played and the stadium turned into a lively disco before the women’s marathon medallists, who closed the Games for the first time, received the final medals of Paris 2024.
The stadium then went dark as a golden figure descended from the ceiling to apocalyptic music. The arrival of this character from the future, played by French break dancer Arthur Cadre, marked the beginning of a dystopian journey to an era in which the Olympic Games had disappeared.
Determined to recover them, as Pierre de Coubertin had done at the end of the 19th century, this mysterious being from the future finally achieved his mission when, together with the 270 dancers who participated in the ceremony, they once again managed to raise, as a great collective effort, the Olympic rings on the giant 2,400 square meter stage.
From complainers to fans
After projecting images of the heroes of these Games, the stadium then became a glamorous Parisian club while the French band Phoenix gave a concert alongside several local artists.
“From one day to the next, Paris became a party,” said the president of the organizing committee, Tony Estanguet, who joked that the Games had turned “a nation of irrepressible whiners into passionate fans.”
The president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Thomas Bach, also celebrated the success of a “sensational” edition, before the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, passed the Olympic flag to her counterpart in Los Angeles, Karen Bass.
Next to her was the star gymnast Simone Biles, who would hold onto the flag while someone came from the sky to get her.
In the heights
A light then illuminated a figure on the roof of the Stade de France and from there Tom Cruise lowered himself, like in one of his “Mission Impossible” films.
Cheered on by fans, the American actor arrived on stage and received the flag from Biles before setting off on a motorbike to begin a journey that would end up connecting with Los Angeles, where the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Billie Eilish and Snoop Dogg – viral star in Paris-2024 – were giving a concert on the beach.
From the Parisian night of the Games that are coming to an end to the burning sun of California and the Olympics that are dawning.
Farewell
All that was left was Marchand’s triumphant entry into the Stade de France to extinguish the flame and for Bach to officially close these Games, which showed a friendlier Paris, which wanted to open up to the people and took the opening ceremony out of a stadium for the first time and brought its controversial open water events – not to everyone’s liking – to the Seine.
The public responded and 9.5 million spectators came to watch the competitions, surpassing the record of 8.3 million seen in Atlanta in 1996.
Paris put its exuberance at the service of its third Games, and it worked. In four years, Los Angeles and its stars await.
Latest medals
The final day of the Games had its stellar moments in terms of sport. The US women’s basketball team beat the French team by a narrow score of 67-66, to claim eight consecutive Olympic crowns.
With this feat, the United States ended the Paris Olympics as the medal leader, tied with China at 40 golds.
Team USA, however, has more silver medals than China (44 to 27), and more medals overall, 126 to 91. Japan finished third, with 45 medals overall (20-12-13).
In the morning, Dutchwoman Sifan Hassan caused a sensation in the women’s marathon, which for the first time closed athletics at the Games.
The athlete, who had just won two bronze medals in the 5,000 and 10,000 meters at the Stade de France, finished the legendary distance of 42.195 km in a time of 2h, 22m, and 55 seconds.
A time that earned her a new Olympic record and the honor of receiving her medal at the closing ceremony, supported by thousands of athletes from the participating delegations and a more than enthusiastic audience.
Several of the events held in Paris had an extraordinary setting the Eiffel Tower in front of the beach volleyball court, the Palace of Versailles in the equestrian events, the obelisk in Place de la Concorde accompanying the BMX, not forgetting the waves of Tahiti, where the Brazilian surfer Gabriel Medina starred in one of the most iconic images of these Games, levitating above the water, arm raised.
The Seine was another of the main protagonists. Despite the 1.4 billion euros spent on cleaning up the river, the organization was left in a cold sweat every day and was forced to cancel several training sessions and postpone the men’s triathlon by one day, although all the planned competitions, including open water swimming, were able to take place.
Paris 2024 was also a success with the public, despite the high prices more than 9.5 million tickets were sold, well above the previous record of Atlanta 1996, when 8.3 million were sold.
