One Candidate Has Early Edge for IOC President
By Ed Hula
The biggest-ever field to run for president of the IOC is a healthy sign. Seven members have put their names forward, despite the challenges and demands of the post. That’s two more candidates than 2013, the last time a new president was chosen. Thomas Bach, 70, will step down next June. In August he rejected a call to extend his term for four more years, in part because it would have meant tinkering with the charter that governs the IOC.
Each of the seven brings distinctive qualities suitable for the IOC job. But given the state of the world, some IOC rules and a bit of history, one candidate appears to have an edge.
First, the slate of contenders eager to succeed Bach:
Sebastian Coe, 67, Great Britain, president of World Athletics, Olympian.
Kirsty Coventry, 41, Zimbabwe Minister of Sport, IOC Executive Board member, Olympian
Johan Eliasch, 62, Great Britain, president of ski federation FIS.
Prince Feisal al Hussein, 60, president of the Jordan Olympic Committee, IOC Executive Board member.
David Lappartient, 51, president of cycling federation UCI.
Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr., 64, Spain, IOC vice president.
Morinari Watanabe, 65, Japan, president of FIG, the international gymnastics federation.
Four of the nominees are heads of international federations: Coe of World Athletics, Watanabe from gymnastics, Lappartient of cycling and Eliasch skiing.
Each one is handicapped by their status as IOC members linked to their federation. Lose that federation leadership and they no longer are qualified as IOC members. Some finagling by the IOC Session to accommodate them might be possible, but who needs the complication?
Compounding that technicality, historically no IOC president has moved from an IF leadership to the IOC presidency.
Prince Feisal would be able to serve only eight years as president, given his mandate as an IOC member calls for retirement at age 70. For him to seek a final four-year term as IOC president would require a vote by the IOC Session to extend his membership.
If he is chosen as the next IOC president Samaranch would need an IOC vote in 2030 to extend his IOC term as he hits age 70 retirement that year. The term extension would enable him to continue to serve as president for four more years. Under IOC rules he would not be eligible to receive a second extension and thus unable to seek a final term of four years as president. Samaranch’s father was the last president to serve under IOC rules that had no term limits. The elder Samaranch served 21 years before stepping down in 2001, the year the 12-year term took effect.
One candidate beats the rest of the field with regards both to age and potential conflicts with a federation leadership. Kirsty Coventry, the sports minister for Zimbabwe, will be 42 next year, which means she would be able to serve one eight-year and one four-year term and remain in office until 2037.
Coventry is one of only two Olympians in the running. She has three gold medals in swimming; Coe won two golds in athletics. Coventry entered the IOC in 2013 as a member of the Athletes Commission. That included four years as chair (2018 to 2021) and a seat on the 15-member Executive Board. When she came off the Athletes Commission in 2021 she was named an individual member, able to serve until age 70. Last year Coventry returned to the EB for a four-year term. The only other EB member running for president is Samaranch.
To call Coventry Bach’s protégée would not be a stretch although he will not make any public comment in accordance with IOC rules. Coventry remains the youngest member of the EB. Nonetheless, Bach has handed her high profile assignments. She chairs the commissions overseeing the 2026 Youth Olympic Games in Dakar and the 2032 Olympics in Brisbane.
A graduate of Auburn University in the U.S., Coventry has applied her business studies as a member of the IOC Finance commission. She was Bach’s choice to address the United Nations General Assembly in June where she spoke about the IOC commitment to sustainability. Her appearance is believed to be the first for an IOC member who is not president.
So far in the era of presidential term limits the candidate said to be the favorite of the incumbent has coasted to an easy victory.
Jacques Rogge was the favorite of Samaranch senior in 2001. Some 12 years later, Rogge gave his blessings to Bach. Now it’s Bach’s turn to have a say, however discrete, in who takes over from him next June.
There are some other firsts to recognize as possible during this election. Watanabe and Feisal would be the first from Asia. Eliasch — elected in July at the Session in Paris — would be the first from winter sports and the shortest in IOC tenure.
Samaranch would be the only son of an IOC president to also hold that post. Coe, Eliasch and Lappartient would be the first federation leaders to captain the IOC.
Coventry stands apart from her competitors, all male. The fact that other female IOC members who are also well-suited to the job did not declare suggests an invisible hand at work to make Coventry’s candidacy unique.
Not that they will vote as a monolith, but 46 of the 111 members of the IOC are female. A number of those women hail from Africa and presumably are enthusiastic about naming the first IOC president from the continent. Coventry might accrue more support globally from other members of the IOC sisterhood who realize the opportunity they have to help install a fresh face after more than 125 years of male rule. Coventry is not the first woman to run for IOC president. That distinction goes to Anita Defrantz who was eliminated early in the 2001 election won by Rogge.
Candidates have yet to file the limited briefs permitted under campaign rules. Other than this scant information, media promotion is not allowed. Members will meet in January in Switzerland in camera to hear the proposals from the seven contenders. The election is in Greece in late March. Perhaps some of them may leave the race as one candidacy appears to become inevitable. Today that edge belongs to Kirsty Coventry.