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11 Surprising Rules All Olympians Must Follow; Find Out the Dos and Don'ts of the Olympic Village
Here are the surprising rules Team USA athletes must follow in the Olympic Village during the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, from arriving early to those viral cardboard beds. Read on to find out!
Participating in the Olympic Games is a huge honor for athletes in their respective sports—especially because they get to travel to beautiful countries around the world for the event. They usually stay in the Olympic Village when they arrive in the host country. For the 2024 Summer Olympics, more than 14,250 athletes will stay at the Village, which spans three cities: Saint-Denis, Saint Ouen, and L'Île-Saint-Denis.
They won't be far from the action either. According to Olympic officials, "Aside from those training at their competition venues, 100% of the athletes will train within 20 minutes from the Village, and 60% of those will train within the Village itself. 85% of athletes will be accommodated less than 30 minutes away from their competition venue." Plus, shuttle buses and e-bikes will be available for travel around the Village.
However, there are many rules that athletes have to follow while they stay in the Village—which, according to several athletes, is more like a college dorm and less like a fancy hotel. They share rooms, common areas, and bathrooms and are grouped by sport despite their age differences.
You may wonder, who even sets these rules? And why are they so strict? Well, The International Olympic Committee, or the IOC, makes most of these rules so athletes can stay at the top of their game during this exciting time. Ahead, find all the rules athletes have to follow in the Olympic Village!
Athletes aren't allowed entry to the Olympic Village until July 18
The Olympic Village officially opened on Tuesday, July 18. That means all qualifying athletes can now move into their country's residences. However, they do not have to move in on that exact day.
They have to leave the Village within 48 hours after their last competition
They can't stay in the Village more than 2 days after they finish their competition or are eliminated. Their Olympic Identity and Accreditation Card, which grants them access to the building, will be deactivated within that time frame, per the period of stay guidelines.
Athletes must reside with their country's team
Athletes must live with the team they're representing, so Team USA must live with Team USA. "We can't share an apartment with another country," Team USA's Olympic Village Director Daniel Smith makes clear, via People.
"There are different residential zones in the Olympic Village," he explains. "They call them legacy. These are built and they will be given to the community or sold in the community after the games, so they are apartment buildings that eventually will be individual towers."
For the Olympics setup, Smith says the residence halls resemble "clusters of buildings." The amount of housing a country gets depends on the "size of the delegation," he explains, noting that Team USA has four buildings for its delegation of 593 athletes.
"We are in the Bastille cluster. We have 90% of this cluster. It's technically four buildings," he breaks down, clarifying they don't have the top floor of one of the buildings. "Two of them are 11 stories high, and the other two are eight stories high. It's just under 600 individual sleeping rooms... Every building has a completely different configuration."
Protests and political, religious, or racial propaganda are not allowed
This rule was put into place ahead of the 2020 competition amid Black Lives Matter and Anti-AAPI Hate protests that were happening at the time. It's faced significant pushback since then, but in a nutshell, athletes aren't allowed to protest or push any political, religious, or racial propaganda at any Olympic venues, including:
- On the field of play
- In the Olympic Village
- During Olympic medal ceremonies
- During the Opening, Closing, and other official Ceremonies
Any protests that happen outside Olympic venues must comply with local laws.
They can 'technically' post on social media from the Village
The IOC encourages all athletes to share their experience at the Games with others through their personal social media accounts and websites... but they have to follow specific guidelines, of course. First things first, athletes can take photos and record audio and videos within the Olympic Village, except for restricted areas like medical spots or doping control stations. They're also required to respect the privacy of others and are not allowed to capture content of other residents unless they have their consent beforehand.
Obviously, their posts have to be consistent with the Olympic values, meaning they can't be discriminatory or obscene. Posts aren't permitted for sharing if they are:
- Commercial
- Captured in medical areas
- Uses AI or AI-generated content or outputs
- Live videos or longer than 2 minutes each
Family and friends aren't allowed to visit in the Olympic Village
While every delegation manages entry into the Olympic Village differently, Smith makes clear that Team USA only allows athletes and select staff into its quarters. "Based on your team size, you're allotted a certain amount of accreditations," he explains of the access pass equivalents.
Family and friends aren’t allowed in the Olympic Village. Only athletes and select staff are permitted entry. "Our primary goal is to create a healthy and safe environment focused on high performance," says Smith. Athletes can meet their families outside the Village in the city of Paris.
Nursing athletes are allowed to bring infants into the Olympic Village
There is "one exception" to the family and friends access limitation in the Olympic Village, Smith notes. That is, athletes who are nursing mothers are allowed to bring their infants into the Village Nursery.
There’s a nursery run by P&G where they can breastfeed and access high-quality diapers and wipes. This setup supports both parents and infants, especially during such a critical time in an athlete’s life.
Athletes who are minors must stay with minors
Not all athletes who qualified for the Olympics are of legal age, including Team USA's 16-year-old gymnastics phenom Hezly Rivera and 17-year-old swim star Alex Shackell.
Smith says the USOPC has "very strict guidelines" in place regarding who underage athletes are allowed to room with, noting they "really try to keep minors in rooms with minors." He adds, "So we don't mix folks that are under 18 with folks that are over 18, except for very specific circumstances."
Even under those specific circumstances, Smith says "a lot of check boxes need to be checked before we allow those one-offs to happen." For example, he notes, "There has to be a parent permission involved, team leader permission involved, NGB permission involved."
Athletes are allowed to customize their mattresses
During the 2020 Tokyo Games, the infamous cardboard beds in the Olympic Village made headlines and they're returning again for the 2024 Summer Olympics, with Smith admitting "these beds are hard as rock."
As for the mattresses? Smith told People, they're "pretty stiff" too. However, athletes—who presumably need the best sleep ahead of the biggest competition of their lives—can customize their mattresses to fit their personal preferences!
Smith added, via People, that based on all these different ways that you can maneuver the mattress, you can make it more firm or less firm.
There is ‘one exception’ to the cardboard beds, however, and Smith says it's "for our Track and Field throwers." He explains, "USA Track and Field ships in larger beds specifically for them... the athletes, just their size, they're big individuals, so they ship in... just for comfort."
Alcohol consumption is not allowed in Team USA's Olympic Village
Alcohol is not allowed in the Olympic Village for Team USA's delegation, specifically. It is a dry Village for Team USA. There's no alcohol permitted in the buildings, pre-competition, during competition or once competition has finished, Smith explains, via People.
Smith cited the Team USA rugby team, for example, noting that tournaments begin on July 24 and run through July 30. After that, "they still have another 12 days in the Village," he says, noting that they may want to "go have fun" and celebrate now that they're done competing.
While the ruling may sound like freshman year of college, there are no RA-equivalents necessarily enforcing the ban.
Athletes are allowed to have sex in the Olympic Village
This rule has officially been lifted for this year's games, meaning that the athletes can (and most definitely will) match each others' freaks. Per CBS News, it was originally put in place during the 2020 Tokyo Olympics to promote social distancing and COVID-19 safety measures.
At the time, athletes were reportedly asked to limit physical contact with each other. Laurent Michaud revealed that the Village will hold about 14,250 residents at the 2024 Paris Games and they're "aiming to have 300,000 condoms for the athletes." However, the 2016 Rio Games passed out 150,000 more condoms, making it a total of 450,000.
In a TikTok video showing off the Olympics-branded condom packaging, sailor Sarah Douglas from Canada held up blue and pink condom holders emblazoned with messages such as “On the field of love, play fair [and] ask for consent” and ”No need to be a gold medalist to wear it.” Some athletes even tested the viral 'Anti-sex' beds in the Olympics, just to prove that they can hold the weight if an athlete wants to do more than just sleep *cough*.
