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Last week, Sebastian Coe, president of World Athletics announced that gold medallists during the 2024 Paris Olympic Games will win $50,000 (€47,000). Silver and bronze medallists will win money starting with the 2028 Los Angeles Games and onwards. This tradition-breaking move has ruffled the feathers of his cohorts.
Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) president David Lappartient doesn’t like it and apparently, World Aquatics is not excited about the prospect of having to pay athletes.
In contrast, the World Athletics Championships pay medallists. The championships are a global championship on par with the athletics portion of the Olympic Games.
Canadian racewalker Evan Dunfee approached Coe after the Tokyo Olympic Games about the 50K event — in which he earned a bronze medal. Dunfee also won bronze at the Doha World Athletics Championships. It appears from the social media post below, that Coe claimed to have no interest in becoming IOC President.
I approached Coe in the Tokyo airport after the Games and told him my thoughts on him getting rid of my event. Left by telling him it would at least serve him well in his IOC Presidency bid, a thing he said assured me he had no business in ever having 🤷♂️ https://t.co/4NkRuy6GPi
— Evan Dunfee (@EvanDunfee) April 20, 2024
According to the publication, Inside the Games, former IOC marketing director Michael Payne claims Coe has “damaged his chances of succeeding Thomas Bach as IOC president” by the move.
Coe, otherwise, has seemed to be interested in running for the IOC presidency once Thomas Bach retires. However, Payne believes Coe has damaged his standing among IOC members. “If it was a presidential ploy, it was a gold medal of an own goal, because who is electing the president? It’s the IOC members. Many of them are international federation presidents, who are apoplectic with rage,” Payne added.
If Payne is accurate in his assertion, the real question is why did Coe not think about his potential future cohorts in the IOC? Perhaps Coe does not have an interest in becoming the president of the IOC.
According to Inside the Games, the Association of Summer Olympic International Federations (ASOIF) confirmed on Friday that World Athletics, a member federation, was “neither informed nor consulted” before the announcement.
It continued, “ASOIF respects and defends the autonomy of each and every member federation. However, when a decision of one IF has a direct impact on the collective interests of the Summer Olympic IFs, it is important and fair to discuss the matter at stake with the other federations in advance.”
