ABSTRACT
One of the key characteristics of any mega-event, such as the Olympic and Paralympic Games, is the numbers of visitors who attend, such as competitors, coaches and support staff, families, officials, fans and spectators. Indeed, the economic success of any such event is dependent upon the number, and expenditure, of visitors, who are a key element in creating the spectacle itself (Crawford, 2004). Although other large-scale sporting events, such as the FIFA World Cup and the Commonwealth Games, for example, are important sport tourist attractions, the Olympic and Paralympic Games, by virtue of both its position as the pre-eminent global sporting event and its almost invariable hosting by cities that are considered to be the top tourist destinations of their type, (for example, Barcelona, Sydney, Athens and London), possesses a number of unique features as a sport tourism attraction. Unlike smaller-scale sport events, where the sporting activity itself is generally the key motivating factor for attendance, the nature and scope of the Olympic and Paralympic Games means that visitors to the Games will be much more heterogeneous in nature, with contrasting motivations, behaviours and experiences. Such visitors are also likely to differ considerably in terms of profile from visitors to the host city who would be expected in other, non-event years (Knott, Fyall and Jones, 2013), thus providing a unique case of sport tourism behaviour.
