Vancouver student, 18, chosen as first Olympic torchbearer
JAMES CHRISTIE
From Tuesday's Globe and Mail
January 20, 2009 at 5:43 AM EST
Patricia Moreno beat one set of odds in being the first runner named as a torchbearer in the lead-up to the Vancouver Olympics. The next will be to show her friends they're wrong when they tease her about falling down with the torch when the 18-year-old Vancouver high-school student takes centre stage with the Olympic flame as it makes its way toward the 2010 Games.
"I don't know how intense it's going to be that day," Ms. Moreno said as she was introduced at a news conference in Toronto. "When the Coke team showed up at the recreation centre where I volunteer around Christmas, I was shaking."
Ms. Moreno was one of thousands of teens who applied online for a torchbearer job at the SoGo Active site, which the beverage maker maintains in partnership with the health-and-wellness organization ParticipAction. She was picked as the first runner to be introduced "because she embodied the infectious attitude of a young person who wanted to be active and make a difference in her community," said David Moran, director of public affairs and communications for Coca-Cola Ltd.
If Ms. Moreno overcame some odds to be selected from the thousands of applicants, so did the beverage maker. Coca-Cola has long been a sponsor of the International Olympic Committee and a sponsor of torch relays dating back to the Atlanta Olympics of 1996. But its pop image has been uncomplimentary, and its sugared marquee product has often been associated with poor diets and youth obesity.
"It's a collaboration," said Kellie Leitch, adviser to Health Canada on healthy children and youth. Dr. Leitch also is a member of the selection panel for the torchbearers. "Obesity among youth has tripled in the last generation," she said. "This is the first generation of kids who won't outlive their parents. But here's an industry partner who is willing to lead the charge toward active living."
Mr. Moran acknowledged that Coke and health advocates are unusual bedfellows, but pointed out that this can be an advantage.
"We can reach a large audience and we can make a difference," he said. In fact, the sugar-sweetened product that gives the company its name is only one of about 80 products marketed to Canadians as the company "reinvents" itself as a "total hydration" operation. Coke also sells bottled water, energy drinks, coffee and juices.
About 1,000 youths will be selected from the SoGo Active teens. Another 1,100 will be picked by the selection panel from essay writers who enter at iCoke.ca, and describe how Canadians can improve their communities through a "Live Active, Live Green" approach. Other torchbearers will be designated by another presenting sponsor, RBC, Games organizer VANOC and other sponsors and suppliers.
Ms. Moreno will be one of 12,000 torchbearers taking part in the longest domestic journey yet for the Olympic flame, spanning some 45,000 kilometres over 106 days, starting on Oct. 30 in Victoria.
The route stretches to Canada's three coasts, from Vancouver Island to Cape Breton to Ellesmere Island in the north. The Olympic flame will reach Alert, Nunavut, the farthest north it will have yet journeyed. The route is designed to bring the flame within an hour's drive of 90 per cent of Canadians. The torch, which is being designed by Bombardier, is to be unveiled in Montreal next month. source: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090120.wtorch20/BNStory/National/home
