Sport Tourism and its History and Contribution of Olympic Games to Touristic Promotion

Tourism sector is one of the sectors that gain momentum and importance with the globalization. One of the important sub branches of the tourism that attracts attention with 1- 1-5 billion people and approximately 2 trillion world incomes is sport tourism. The first tourism movement is the start of Olympics in Ancient Greek and movement of people who want to watch these games. Due to the fact that this tourism type that emerges thanks to the sports activities, contributes the economic and social structure of that region, states carry out significant lobbying activities to host Olympics. The mass of the number of the sportsmen to attend to the sport activity and audience that come to watch these games and more importantly live streams from the place of the games contribute significantly to the promotion of that region. While eating and drinking, traveling, souvenirs expenses are direct incomes; it significantly contributes to the transportation and carriage sector. The appearance of before and after of the Olympic regions show great difference. One of the most important examples is the province of Mersin that hosts the latest Mediterranean games. While infrastructure and supra structure investments made for the preparation of city to the games in a brief time change the appearance of the city, national and international promotions significantly change the province. Olympic causes important development beyond measure. The objective of this study is to specify social and economic contributions of tourism type emerged by the sport activities on the region and raise awareness for its contribution to country promotion. The study bases significantly on the literature review. The study will have a solid structure by making use of the domestic and international statistical data. The scope of the study is Olympics in general and Mediterranean games in Mersin Province in particular.