2006 Asian Games

The 2006 Asian Games (Arabic: دورة الألعاب الآسيوية 2006, romanized: Dawrat al-ʼAl‘ab al-Asīawīah 2006), officially known as the XV Asiad or 15th Asian Games (Arabic: دورة الألعاب الآسيوية الخامسة عشرة, and commonly known as Doha 2006 (Arabic: الدوحة 2006), were an Asian multi-sport event held in Doha, Qatar, from December 1 to 15, 2006, with 424 events in 39 sports featured in the games. Doha was the first city in its region and only the second in West Asia (following Tehran in 1974) to host the games. The city will host the games again in 2030.

It was the first time that all 45 member nations of the Olympic Council of Asia took part in this event. Also, Eurosport broadcast the event, marking the first time that the event was broadcast outside the continent. 21 competition venues were used for the Games including the newly constructed Aspire Indoor Sports Complex. The opening and closing ceremonies of the Games were held at Khalifa International Stadium. The trampoline discipline of gymnastics, as well as chess and triathlon made their debut at the Games.

The final medal tally was led by China, followed by South Korea and Japan. Qatar finished in ninth place. Tajikistan, Jordan and United Arab Emirates won their first ever Asian Games gold medals. 7 world and 23 Asian records were broken during the games, while South Korean swimmer Park Tae-hwan was announced as the most valuable player.

Doha, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur and New Delhi submitted their formal bids by the deadline 30 June 2000. Prior to the voting, evaluation committee of the OCA, headed by the then vice-president of the association Muhammad Latif Butt inspected Doha on 13 and 14 July 2000, New Delhi on 15 and 16 July 2000, Kuala Lumpur on 17 and 18 July 2000, and Hong Kong on 19 and 20 July 2000.

On November 12, 2000, voting for the 2006 venue took place during the 19th Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) General Assembly held in Busan, South Korea. The voting involved the 41 members of the Olympic Council of Asia and consisted of three rounds, each round eliminating one of the bidding cities. After the first round, New Delhi was eliminated, with only two votes. The second round of voting, with three remaining candidates, gave Doha as the result.

Under the regulations of the OCA, a candidate which gains more than half of the available votes (at least 21 out of 41 votes) will automatically be selected as the host, and the remaining rounds of voting will be cancelled. When Doha gained 22 out of 41 votes this meant they were selected to host the 2006 Asian Games. Most of Qatar's votes came from the unanimous support from West Asian countries.

After the major upset, Malaysia and Hong Kong, China expressed their disappointment. Malaysia said that the selection of Doha was ridiculous and that the selection of Doha was influenced by Qatar's economic wealth.

Qatar spent US$2.8 billion on preparing venues, including a major upgrade to the 50,000-seat Khalifa Stadium from its original 20,000-seat capacity and the construction of the Aspire indoor sports complex, the world's largest indoor multi-sports dome.