With the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics a year away, 1 venue remains uncertain

In Sochi, workers were still hammering away in the media village and shower water ran yellow when journalists from around the world arrived for the 2014 Winter Games.

The chaotic preparations for the 2016 Summer Games in Rio de Janeiro were labelled the "worst" ever by a vice president of the International Olympic Committee.

The next Olympics, though, might set an unofficial record for running late on preparations.

That's because the century-old sliding centre being completely rebuilt for the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Games is pushing the deadline so tight that the IOC has gone so far as to demand a Plan B option that would require moving bobsleigh, luge and skeleton events all the way to Lake Placid, N.Y., if the track in Italy isn't finished in time.

Thursday marks exactly one year to go before the Feb. 6, 2026 opening ceremony at the San Siro stadium and the track in Cortina is still a half-completed construction site.

The IOC has set a deadline for the end of next month for pre-certification of the Cortina track and nobody is saying for sure if it will pass the test.

But Fabio Saldini, the Italian government commissioner in charge of the $123 million US project, told The Associated Press during a recent visit that almost 70 per cent of the track was completed — even if it was tough to tell inside the muddy and chaotic construction site.

With 180 people working from 6 a.m. to 1 a.m. every day to build the sliding centre, the first ice is slated to be laid down on the track at the start of March.

"We have huge support from the construction firms, the government and [Infrastructure and Transport Minister Matteo] Salvini," Saldini said. "With everyone's support, we will be able to finish in time."

Construction began less