The Ecstasy and the Agony

Tension mounted Wednesday afternoon in Trafalgar Square, where thousands gathered to find out whether London would host the 2012 Summer Olympic Games.

“I’m so nervous, I feel like I’m standing on the track again,” two-time Olympic gold medal winner Kelly Holmes said from a stage facing the crowd.

“This is worse than being on the track,” silver medalist Steve Cram said. “At least you’re in control there. You have no control over this.”

As the clock ticked toward 12:46 p.m. in London, men, women and children waved white “Back the Bid” flags and raised red, green, yellow and blue balloons in the air. “Woo-hoo!” “Go, London!” they cheered.

And then Jacques Rogge, president of the International Olympic Committee, appeared on television with an envelope in his hands. A hush swept over the square.

“The IOC has the honor of announcing the Games of the 30th Olympiad in 2012 are awarded to,” he said, as the crowd held its breath, “the city of London.”

Applause and shouts of joy erupted from the audience. Confetti came sprinkling down. Nine Royal Air Force planes zoomed by overhead, leaving plumes of red, white and blue in their wake.

“Fantastic! This is brilliant news for London!” shouted Mick McLoughlin, 45, pumping his fists in the air and jumping up and down.

“I didn’t think they’d do it,” he said, tears in his eyes. He turned to those beside him, and hugged them.

“This is my business for the next 10 years,” said Joel Goldman, 37, who buys and sells hotels for a living. He had come to hear the news on his lunch break. “But I wouldn’t call it a lunch break. It’s business development!”

A 500-acre Olympic Park will be built in the Lower Lea Valley, six miles from the city’s center. The Games are expected to bring not only sports venues but also new homes and jobs.

Improvements to London’s aging transportation system are also planned. A high-speed “Olympic Javelin” train would take fans from London to the Olympic Park in seven minutes.

Some Londoners expressed worries about the cost of staging the Games, while others questioned whether organizational hurdles could be surmounted.

“We saw what it did for Sydney. We saw what it did in Athens. It will be the same in London,” Cram said. “For those people who think it’s not a good thing, I would just say, ‘Be patient, hang around and wait and see what happens. It will be wonderful.’ ”

In France, “unbelievable” and “incredible” were on the lips of most citizens.

“This is a major disappointment that I don’t understand, to tell you the truth,” Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe said from Singapore. “I met a lot of members from the IOC, and they all told me they didn’t understand.”

After the bitter disappointment and incomprehension felt by the French athletes and supporters came the anger and the doubts raised concerning London’s approach to IOC members and what was seen from Paris as “aggressive lobbying”.

“I think what made us lose is that we played fair,” Delanoe said. “I wonder what will happen to the Olympic spirit if we have to stop playing fair to win such a competition.”

Crestfallen French Athletics Federation President Bernard Amsalem also criticized London’s lobbying methods. “The geopolitical aspect probably won over the sportive spirit,” he said. “France respected all the rules, ethics too, unlike the British.”

New Yorkers managed to keep their disappointment in check.

“We don’t need the reassurance from the International Olympic Committee or anyone else that New York is a world-class city,” U.S. Rep. Anthony D. Weiner, a Democratic mayoral candidate, told Associated Press. “We don’t need to put New York on the map. It’s already the center of the universe.”

Brown reported from London and Sicakyuz from Paris.