Olympics-Australian Institute of Sport to get $165 mln upgrade

MELBOURNE: Australia will spend A$250 million ($165.08 million) upgrading its national sporting academy in Canberra to put the nation in a "positive frame" in the lead-up to hosting the 2032 Brisbane Olympics, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Friday. Opened in 1981, the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) has helped nurture a slew of Olympic and world champion athletes but fell into decline in recent years due to funding cuts and as sports shifted their high performance centres to state-based hubs.

Australia's government has committed the funds in next week's national budget to upgrade the AIS, including building a new high-performance training and testing centre, an indoor dome for track and field, and an accommodation block with 192 beds. "This facility has been allowed to decay and not be as good as it should be," Albanese told reporters on Friday.

"By making this announcement today, we position ourselves to be in a really positive frame in the lead-up to 2032, when we will host for the third time the Olympics that will be so important in Brisbane." Australia had previously hosted the Summer Olympics in Sydney in 2000 and in Melbourne in 1956. ($1 = 1.5145 Australian dollars)