The International Olympic Committee (IOC) is currently convened in Ancient Olympia, Greece – the site that started the ancient Olympics – to select a new president.
Committee members will cast their votes later today at 4:00 local time (10:00 AM ET). Of the seven total candidates, three are believed to be frontrunners. Learn about each of their backgrounds and campaign platforms on their hands as they succeed outgoing president Thomas Bach.
Kirsty Coventry
No doubt the name most familiar to and with the swimming world, Zimbabwean Olympic gold medalist Kirsty Coventry is seen as one of the most likely candidates to take office. Apart from being the first swammer in the world’s most powerful sports seat, Coventry would also be the first woman, youngest person (at 41 years of age), and first person from outside of the U.S. or Europe to lead the committee.
Coventry’s Olympic credentials include serving on the IOC from 2012-2019 and assuming a role on the IOC executive committee starting in 2023. In between her IOC stints, Zimbabwe’s president appointed her as the country’s MInister of Youth, Sport, Arts, and Recreation.
As an athlete, Coventry earned seven individual medals at the 2004 Athens and 2008 Beijing Olympics, capturing gold in the 200 backstroke at both meets. She retired in 2016 as Africa’s most decorated Olympian and tied Kriszstina Egerszegi as the women’s swimmer with the most individual Olympic medals (a feat since surpassed by Katie Ledecky). She also previously held world records in both the 100 and 200 backstroke.
If elected, Coventry would join current president Bach as the second IOC president to be a Olympic gold medalist themself (Bach captured fencing gold at the 1976 Montreal Olympics). Many see Coventry, who works closely with Bach on the executive committee, as Bach’s pick for the position. Though this works in her favor if true, it doesn’t guarantee her a win, as the vote comes down to the 110-person committee.
Coventry’s athletic leadership career has not been without controversy. The Zimbabwe Olympic Committee (ZOC) was scrutinized for reportedly sending 67 officials to the Paris Olympics despite only seven athletes competing. ZOC’s president, Thabani Gonye, refuted this claim.
One of Coventry’s focuses during her campaign has been leveraging her athlete experience to restore relations with TOP (The Olympic Network) sponsors. Several sponsors left the network after the Paris games.
Sebastian Coe
Like Coventry, Sebastian Coe is a frontrunner for the position and has a gold medal history.
The 68-year-old became a household name in his home country, the United Kingdom, by winning gold in the 1500m track event at the 1980 Moscow and 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. His 1:41.73 800 from 1981 still stands as the British national record.
After retiring from athletics in the 90s, Coe stayed in the public eye by serving as a Member of Parliament as a member of the Conservative Party and later Chief of Staff to the Leader of the Opposition.
Coe returned to sports in an administrative role during London’s 2012 Olympic bid. He served as Chair of the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games from 2005 until after the Olympics, and served as Chairman from 2008 to 2012.
Since 2015, Coe has headed the World Athletics, one of the Olympics’ marquee events. He’s been an IOC member since 2020.
Coe certainly is one of, if not the, most prolific figures running for office. Some of his most vocal candidate platforms have included decentralizing power in the IOC, keeping transgender women out of women’s sports, and financial rewards for athlete performance.
Juan Antonio Samaranch Salisachs
Samaranch, native of Spain, differs from the two other front-runner candidates in two key ways: 1) his background is in finance as opposed to politics and 2) he comes from an IOC family legacy. His father, Juan Antonio, served as the IOC President from 1980-2001.
Samaranch, now 65, joined the IOC on the very same meeting his father resigned at. Since then, he’s been involved in global sports administration nonstop. Most notably, he served as IOC Vice President under Bach from 2016-2020. He was also a member of the Organizing Committee for the 2006 Turin and 2014 Moscow Winter Olympics. In 2022, he reportedly was the IOC’s main point of contact with Chinese President Xi Jinping as they navigated the Beijing Winter Olympics in a lockdown.
Prior to his sports career, he earned an MBA at New York University and worked in financial restructuring in New York City and London. The Spaniard has used this background, as well as his global reach with the U.S,. Russia, and China, as selling points for his candidacy.
One of Samaranch’s platform priorities has been for the IOC to loosen broadcast regulations and allow athletes to use their own Olympic footage on their social media.
See all the candidates, their platforms, election rules, and more here.
I mean… it’s nice that it’s a swimmer and as a woman, I’m all for putting women into positions of leadership. But honestly, I think Coe would have probably been a better choice for the athletes.
Coventry wins!
I assume Coe will be asked to relinquish his role as head honcho of track and field if selected to head the IOC.
I think it will either be Coventry or Coe.