In preparation for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Los Angeles, the Olympic torch will make its way across all 50 states starting in the City of Atlanta.
LA28, the official organizing committee of the next summer games, gathered a star-studded list of Olympic athletes, civic leaders, and Atlanta heroes on Sept. 29 to announce the Olympic torch tour.
It’s been 30 years since Atlanta hosted the Summer Olympics, the only East Coast city to do so. Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens said Los Angeles has its own special place in Olympic history, as the 1984 games in Los Angeles helped provide a model for Atlanta to use in 1996. Los Angeles is the third city to host three Olympic Games.
“And all these years later, these two great Olympic cities are still connected,” Dickens said. “In 1996, the flame traveled from Greece to Los Angeles, where Atlanta’s Olympic torch relay began its journey across America. Now that journey comes full circle as Los Angeles prepares for 2028.”
Four-time Olympic gold medalist, Chief Athlete Officer, and Atlanta 1996 torchbearer Janet Evans recalled passing the torch in Atlanta. Climbing the steps to the cauldron, Evans watched as heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali lit the flame.
“In that moment, I understood that the Olympics are an opportunity to bring people together and carry things forward,” Evans said.
Evans was a member of the Atlanta bid committee and the Atlanta organizing committee. She worked with Billy Payne, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games (ACOG).
Ali’s widow, Lonnie Ali, recalled the same moment. Muhammad stepped up to light the cauldron but a mechanical issue caused a delay. He held the torch steady, stayed calm, and the flame caught. Lonnie recalled that members of the audience – including former President Bill Clinton – were crying, which Muhammad thought was out of sympathy for his condition with Parkinson’s Disease.
“I had to convince them that no, that wasn’t it at all,” Lonnie said. “They were crying because they were so happy to see [Ali] out there being courageous, holding that flame high. He would later call it one of his great moments of his life.”
The joint announcement by Dickens and LA28 President and Chairman Casey Wasserman comes during a debate over relocating the Olympic cauldron from Summerhill to Centennial Olympic Park. While residents of the neighborhood want to keep the piece of history, Georgia State University said in June the cauldron would be moved.
The 2028 Summer Olympic Games will celebrate historic milestones: it will be the first Olympic Games to feature more women athletes than men, it will debut new Olympic and Paralympic sports, and it will be the first Games since 1948 to not build new, permanent infrastructure.
