RIO DE JANERIO (Reuters):BRAZIL IS spending US$2 billion staging the Pan American Games, but it is only the downpayment on the country's bold plans to land the world's biggest sporting prizes - the World Cup and a Summer Olympics.
The 15th Pan Am Games open today at the iconic and refurbished Maracana Stadium but Brazil's ambitions will extend well beyond topping the medal table 16 days later.
Brazil has long been burdened with the perception it is not ready for the mammoth financial and organisational challenge of hosting either of the world's two biggest sporting events.
A successful Games, however, would go a long way towards bolstering confidence that Brazil's time has arrived. With South America in line to stage the 2014 World Cup, Brazil has already put in a claim to the event.
The 2016 Summer Games are also on the Brazilian radar with no South American country having yet hosted an Olympics.
Athletes Chase medals
While Brazilian sporting officials look to the future, 5,500 athletes from 42 countries across North, South and Central America have more immediate concerns as they chase medals in 31 Olympic sports.
Hockey, modern pentathlon, shooting, synchronised swimming, table tennis, triathlon and water polo offer direct qualification to the 2008 Beijing Olympics, an added incentive to athletes in those sports. However, the competition, with the Games, having failed to produce a world record since 1979, is unlikely to match Rio's breathtaking back drop and first-class facility.
Build-up
The U.S., which has dominated the Games winning twice as many medals as any other nation, has entered 595 athletes, the other Pan Am powerhouses Cuba, 483, and Canada, 470.
Cuba and Canada are using the Games as a key part of their Beijing build-up, whereas the U.S. is sending top-ranked teams or athletes in just 16 sports with its swimming national championships starting on July 31 and the athletics World Championships next month in Japan.
Argentina, Brazil, U.S. and Canada have developed plenty of NBA basketball talent but there will be no Dream Teams in Brazil.
Even the soccer competition is unlikely to generate the usual frenzied excitement with Latin America's best involved in the Copa America and the Under-20 World Youth Cup.
As hosts, Brazil managed to entice most of its top athletes to take part, but in the end it will be judged on how smoothly the most expensive Pan Am Games in history were run, not on how many medals it won.
