Seeing the Olympics on a Budget

The following is a guest post written by Danny Gamache, aka "The Success Professor".

The Olympics in Beijing will be my fourth Olympics Games.  No, I'm not an athlete or a coach, but rather an avid Olympic fan and spectator.  In the late 1990's I set the goal to attend every Olympic Games starting at the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City.  Up until now I have achieved this goal attending the Olympics in Salt Lake City, Athens, Torino and now Beijing.  Going has not always been easy.  I have had to carefully budget and look for ways to save money.

What I have found is that the Olympics provide a great opportunity to travel, experience amazing sports action, and see beautiful cities.  Most people think that the Olympics are crowded and expensive.  While the games can be expensive if you want to go first class, it is possible to have an amazing experience on a budget.  Further, because so many people think that the games will be overcrowded, they are often far from it.  Tourist sites often have smaller crowds than non-Olympic years because regular tourists simply stay away.  The following are some tips to see the Olympics on a budget.

1. Spend time researching cheap flights - The largest cost of any overseas Olympic trip will be the flights (I drove to Salt Lake City).  As such, it is important to take some time and research flights well.  Visit many different travel sites, and check prices frequently.  Some web sites such as http://www.kayak.com/ are useful because they check multiple sites at the same time.  Prices for airfare fluctuate significantly so check often.  I've seen flights drop $500 in one morning and increase back up by that evening.  It also may be worth driving to a nearby city perhaps even 200 or 300 miles away in order to save several hundred dollars.  I did this for the Athens Olympics.  I was able to save over $500 by driving a few hours.

2. Consider staying outside of the main Olympic city - You can often save significant money on your accommodations by staying outside of the main Olympic city.  While this can sometimes add to the travel time, the savings can be worth it.   During the Salt Lake City Olympics, I stayed in Ogden; I stayed north of the city proper in Athens, and in Torino I had a 90 minute commute (one direction to Torino proper, the other to the mountain venues).

3. Stay at alternative accommodations - In other words, you don't have to stay in a hotel.  I have slept on the floor of a church, in a dorm room with a dozen men, and in a retreat center. Consider traveling with a group of people (not an official tour group), and you can have significant negotiating power.  The combination of staying outside of the main city and finding alternative accommodations, have allowed my costs to be as low as $10 a night to at most about $40.

4. Purchase your tickets on the street - One of the biggest surprises I found at the Olympics is how easy it is to purchase your tickets on the streets immediately before the event - and it can be cheap!  A large number of tickets to events are sold to tour groups or given to official sponsors; most of the time these organizations have a lot of extra tickets, and as such end up selling them off before the event.  They often use scalpers as their intermediaries however the prices can be well below face value.  I have paid $15 for a speed skating ticket with a face value of $175 or 5 Euro for a bronze medal baseball game.  Certainly I have paid more for events, but I have averaged paying about 33% of face value for my tickets.  I have even been given free tickets such as the tennis ticket given to me by a representative of Sports Illustrated.

The best way to do this is to go to the event without being too attached to whether or not you get in.  That way you can wait for the ticket prices to go down.  The best prices are immediately before the start of the event or shortly after an event has started.

5. Take advantage of free events, activities, and festivals - There are a lot of free things to do at the Olympics.  Corporate sponsors put on a big show.  There are games, displays and shows.  I've seen free concerts at each of the Olympics I've been to including the likes of Mark Anthony and Kelly Clarkson.  Sometimes you need to wait in line for the free tickets, but they can be really worth it.  Often the concerts are part of the medals ceremonies for the winners. The host city also has numerous parties and activities going on.

At the summer Olympics there are also free events you can see.  The Road Cycling events, consisting of the men's and women's road race and the time trials are free, as are the men's and women's marathons.  These are great opportunities to see Olympic events at no charge.

6. Attend the first week of the Olympics - If you can only see part of the Olympics, it is better and cheaper to go during the first week.  There are more competitions on during the first week of the Olympics, and most team sports are in preliminary round play.  Not only are there more events, but they are cheaper.  As teams move towards the finals the prices natural increases as does the demand.  Even the price of tickets on the street goes up for prime events later in the games.  While there are still great deals later in the Olympics, the best value is the first week.

7. Save money on food - You can save money on food as well.  First of all, do not eat at the Olympic venues.  The food at the venues will be the most expensive.  I try to eat a good breakfast and then take a meal replacement bar with me for during the day.  I'll try to eat out in the evening, but be flexible on when I'm going to eat depending on what event I plan on taking in. 

By following these tips you can have an Olympic experience.  While it may be too late for many to plan a trip to Beijing, the next winter Olympics are in Vancouver, Canada.  Start planning now for your trip!  For now, I'm off to Beijing!

Comments

[Kevin]

Good post - I'm considering going to the Vancouver games in 2010 to see some ice hockey, skiing, etc and this might help me out.

[Outdoorgrrl]

Great advice, thanks! We live near Seattle and are planning on going to the games in Vancouver. We'll be staying in Bellingham with friends (30 min outside of Vancouver) to save money. We'll definitely be following your advice on purchasing tickets on the street. Thanks again!

[Foobarista]

Beijing used bar-coded tickets that are attached to their buyers, like airplane tickets, and requires a photo ID to enter the stadium - ostensibly for security reasons. This makes the tickets pretty much impossible to scalp.

Since the technology now exists, one wonders if other Olympic sites will use it...

[Otis]

I used the first tip for Athens. However, I found out that the costs were still astronomical. Instead I flew into Paris, made a most excellent trip through France and Italy and ended up in Athens a few days later. Even though it was about 2-3 days of travel, I wouldn't give up my experiences AND I still saved about $1000 even with the extra travel (Paris $600 + $300 in travel/food/lodging, Athens ticket was $2000+).

Another not safe, but great thing. Camping in the Olympic city. Australia was HUGE about this and it was really great for people there. Athens really didn't offer much, but I ended up spending 8 nights at the Acropolis near Mars Rock for $0/night, stored our heavy bags in internet cafe's for about $5/day, and didn't have to pay the $90/night for a hostel in which I would have had to share a room with 14 other people.

Finally, talk to people. We met some Americans that had family that didn't want to go to the games that evening, so they had a couple extra tickets. They invited us to join them, we got almost perfect tickets for free to the event that my buddy did in college (Mens 3000m). Not only that, but we had great company and have an experience to talk about for the rest of our lives. Never forget to be friendly and talk to those around you. Also, remember the free stuff can be a perk, but most often won't happen don't try to be a mooch. Just delight in the new friends and acquaintances you will make.

[Success Professor]

@ Foobarista

Beijing only used the photo technology for the Opening & Closing ceremonies, not for individual events. Certainly they may extend the technology, but likely tour companies, sponsors, and Olympic delegations will fight against it.

It was much harder to get cheap tickets in Beijing than at other Olympics, however it was still possible. The people of Beijing were very excited about the Olympics (much different attitude than at past Olympics where locals often skip out of town to avoid the perceived crowds) and a such went wild over tickets. It was still possible to get into many events for $15 or $20.

@ Otis
Great comment. I've never thought about camping. I agree build relationships and sometimes you will be surprised with free tickets. It happened to me several times in Athens. In Beijing the relationships didn't end in free tickets but they did lead to finding tickets at a good price.