The organising committee for the Tokyo Olympic Games is reportedly considering streamlining next year’s Olympic torch relay.
Following the delay of the edition of the games until 2021, the need to limit the financial cost of the event is prompting organisers to explore the idea, reports Japanese newspaper the Mainichi Shimbun.
The added uncertainty around the development of the Covid-19 pandemic is also a factor under consideration.
The Tokyo 2020 games had been scheduled to take place from July 24-August 9 this year, but was rescheduled to July 23 to August 8 2021.
If the relay is altered, it may be that the Torch travels different routes around Japan on the same day, rather than one continuous journey across the country as had been planned.
A celebration event had been due to be held in each region the torch passed through, but the committee is now also considering completely dropping this.
Recently, Tokyo 2020 president Yoshiro Mori confirmed that if the Covid-19 crisis caused the Games to be unable to take place in 2021, they would be scrapped.
