Yet Estanguet remains hopeful that the coronavirus pandemic will be something for the history books by the time the Summer Games arrive in France.
“We will look at all the measures they put in place here, but we are still working on our Plan A,” he said. “I want my team first to be at the best level with Plan A.”
That plan is firmly underway. A sponsorship target of one billion euros has just passed the halfway mark, and the keen interest of both France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, and the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, has already helped clear administrative hurdles.
Macron, known to be a sports fan, was a visible presence for the first part of the Tokyo Games, hopping from venue to venue. Hidalgo will be Paris’s representative at the closing ceremony.
“We rely on our ability to have all of them really engaged,” Estanguet said.