The Olympic Games are also an opportunity for collectors to make deals or find treasures. For the first time during the Olympic Games, there is a real collectors’ house. It is the French Association of Olympic and Sports Collectors that is behind it.
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Catherine Salaün is a collector of Olympic objects. In Albertville, in 1992, she started with pins. And since then, she hasn’t missed a single one Olympic Games. ” Pin trading is also part of the Games! ” she exclaims.
Stéphane, his field is weightlifting. The president of the French Association of Olympic and Sports Collectors already has more than 10,000 objects in his collection. I collect everything: bronzes, plates, pennants… I have spherical bars that are over 100 years old. Anything that had a dumbbell on it, I’m interested in it. ” confides Stéphane.
Visitors from all over the world
This small museum looks like a train station. Exhibitors and visitors arrive with their suitcases full of pine trees. Some come from Greece, China…
Randy and Ed are from the United States. It was super heavy to carry on the plane. One suitcase weighed 18 kilos and the other 17. And most of it was pine. “, Ed says. ” This is my twelfth Olympics and my son is in his eighth. What we love is the passion for sports, exchanging pins, meeting people. And all these pins exchanged have meaning for me ” adds Randy.
At the collection house, some are so passionate that they did not come to see sporting events at all, but simply to exchange pins.
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