The "Good Luck Beijing" 2007 International Baseball Tournament will open at Beijng's Wukesong Baseball Field on August 18. Today a press conference was held by the event organizing committee on preparations for the upcoming event, including venue construction, competition management and peripheral supporting systems.

The 2007 International Baseball Tournament is one of the 16 events to be held in Beijing from August to September to test the operations of the venues and competition management for next year's Olympic Games.

After some two years' construction, the Wukesong Baseball Field was delivered for use in mid August, with the completion of construction of all its supporting facilities.

Located in west Beijing and adjacent to the Wukesong Indoor Stadium for Olympic basketball competition, the baseball venue has three fields - one for training, and two for competition with a seating capacity of 3,000 and 12,000 respectively.

Up till now, all the four participating teams have arrived in Beijing and had warming-up training.

The venue team consists of 123 paid staff members and 451 volunteers, who had a rehearsal on August 15 with the assistance of the Beijing municipal baseball team.