Guy Dresser | Royal Canoe Club - Olympics bosses are leaning heavily on the organisers of Rio 2016 after growing alarm that the project is lagging behind schedule. International Olympic committee President Thomas Bach is in Rio this week for urgent talks with the Olympic Games organisers.

For canoeing the concerns have focused on whether the regatta and slalom courses will be ready. Neither is up to speed at the moment and while work is now underway, efforts were diverted for some months as the Rio 2016 organisers tried to shunt the slalom event off to a remote part of Brazil. See our piece at the time.

The International Canoe Federation is clearly delighted with Bach’s visit to Brazil, tweeting a link to an article on Olympic sportsnews website Around the Rings and adding that the IOC President was piling the pressure on the Rio organisers.

The ICF would like nothing better than much-delayed work on the two canoeing courses to get on track – but the talk from IOC insiders is of ‘fury’ at Rio’s inability to get to grips with the project.

“Rio is giving great cause for concern,” one source told me.

Over the past 18 months sports federations and the IOC itself have been publicly supportive about Rio but privately frank in expressing concern to the organisers themselves about the slow pace of work. That tactic now seems to have failed – as we said, some months ago - and is on the verge of being dropped and it seems clear that Olympics bosses are taking the gloves off in their discussions with the Rio 2016 team.

The IOC will surely come to ponder the wisdom of its decision to award the Games to Rio. The South American powerhouse, one of the supposedly dynamic BRIC countries, has seen its economy run of out steam in the global financial crisis, its largest benefactor is facing severe financial difficulties and there have been mass protests and riots on the streets of Rio against both the FIFA World Cup and the Olympic Games.

The IOC is, as ever, determined to put a positive spin on things but that’s looking like an increasingly forlorn task.