Who will be IOC president? The three -way battle becomes a duel

Sebastian Coe has ten minutes for his last big appearance of the day, in front of only 30 approved reporters in a small room in the Château de Vidy by Lausanne. But that’s enough for the Lord to play on the keyboard of his skills. He opens with a joke about long -winded speeches that he doesn’t want to hold now – or? Then he snaps at a dismayed expression, mourning the victims of the plane crash in New York, among them obviously also Olympian. Coe then tells almost seamlessly what would enable him for the Presidential Office in the International Olympic Committee (IOC); He indulges from how his father once gave him the first pair of running shoes for a trip that was supposed to carry Coe to the Olympic victory, into a sports official career – and now to the threshold of the most important position in world sports.

The only official campaign date was scheduled in Lausanne on Thursday: all seven candidates for the vacant IOC presidency presented themselves to the more than 100 IOC members. Little was not reminiscent of choice or fight. The candidates even had to hand over their mobile devices before they were allowed to present themselves to the elected election people at the IOC’s headquarters for 15 minutes – individually, behind closed gates, and questions were strictly prohibited. “I wish we could be more transparent,” Coes competitor Prince Feisal al-Hussein from Jordan gave way: “If we award the most powerful job in organized sport, the world should know who the applicants are.” After all, every applicant was allowed to On Thursday, ask the questions of the selected reporters for ten minutes. Inevitably, inevitably, inevitably could hardly be avoided, after all, asking, getting air and breathing and breathing were allowed.

And the answer to the question of the day could also be answered. This was described by candidate number three, President of the World Cycling Association David Lappartant,: The candidates radiate the format to lead a sports movement with billions of billions and various geopolitical interdependencies? If you pulled the previous impressions and Thursday, this showed an exciting extrapolation. So far, three candidates have been considered serious – Coe, Juan Antonio Samaranch Junior and Kirsty Coventry -, basically it can only amount to a duel between Coe and Samaranch junior, reserved for dramatic twists.

Both had said less recently, but discreetly processed their Olympic address books. Coe took his merits as President of the World Athletics Association as an opportunity to present himself as an alternative to incumbent Thomas Bach, under which many IOC members should feel decoupled. The Coe on Thursday only added a small swipe: you shouldn’t criticize the election line, but you have to take a look at the rules of this bizarre IOC election campaign. Samaranch junior, Filius of the former IOC patron Samaranch Senior, was as presidential as it was aggressive. For example, he promised to select the hosts of the Olympic Games more transparently in the future. And he indicated that he wanted to give the IOC a new business model, but more on that later.

Several IOC members are said to have complained about printing from the IOC leadership to support Kirsty Coventry

So while the favorites beautiful figure made, the third favorite maneuvered herself. Kirsty Coventry, seven -time Olympic medalists in swimming and since 2019 minister, for sport in Zimbabwe, had a strong moment: she does not want to be chosen because of her gender or origin, but by strength of her competence. On Thursday, however, she did not support them with a specific advance. Instead, she had to contradict the long-strengthened impression several times that she was the shadow candidate of the still president. Only the long-time Olympic reporter Duncan Mackay had just reported that “some IOC members had complained internally about the pressure that Bach should exercise on them to support Coventry”. An IOC member is said to have threatened to report all of the ethics committee. That would inevitably be a complaint against the current IOC president-who would have violated the rules particularly massively. (The IOC Ethics Commission only announced on SZ request that it would not be available to any such symptoms.)

Coventry then seriously confirmed that the debate about the women’s boxing tournament in Paris could hardly have been predicted. This only ignored such minor processes as those that the Boxing World Association had suspended two boxers before the Paris games. When Coventry got into the leaning, IOC spokesman Mark Adams remembered so by chance that the ten minutes of speaking had expired.

The rest of the candidates? There was hardly any noticeable accents beyond the known. Cycling World Association President Lappartant emphasized after recently identifying a friend of cycling in Donald Trump that he would of course confident to the US President. Ski and Snowboard World Association President Johan Eliasch told vaguely that a top organization, like the IOC, also needs the most qualified board-and saved all the legal disputes and debates that have been romping on the FIS tip since it was taken over. Prince Feisal sharpened his profile as a candidate for peace that Russia and Belarus welcomed again in world sports. And Gymnastics World Association President Morinari Watanabe said with the freedom of a chanceless outsider that he had proposed Olympic games on five continents in parallel because the IOC could then dictate less and would have to cooperate more with local organizers.

Not only that is a little too experimentally the Olympic conclave when the new boss is elected in March. It will be more attentive to pursue the proposal that Juan Antonio Samaranch Junior recently sharpened. The Spaniard, active as an investment banker for years, wants to put up an Olympic fund in the event of his choice and fill it with one billion, for example with well -known donors from private equity. These would be given access to valuable Olympic resources such as sponsorship and TV production. This is also said to do this independently of a few sponsors who contributed almost 2.2 of the 7.3 billion IOC income in the past Olympic cycle – most recently jumped off in Panasonic, Toyota and Bridgestone. Is that the type of financial incentives that make Samaranch an advantage?

The hot phase of the race, it is open.