Athletes do not always have the leading role within the Olympic institution. In Singapore, the 6th IOC International Athletes' Forum, organized from June 27 to 29, gave them the floor. They took it. And tried to make himself heard.
In the presence of Jacques Rogge, President of the IOC, and incidentally the six candidates for his succession, the athletes gathered in the Asian city-state called for better communication between the different components of the sports movement. Between the various services, but also on social media, a universe where the IOC moves slowly and cautiously. Jacques Rogge seems to have heard them, as proof of this comment: “The Olympians are influential role models, especially among young people. »
The three plenary sessions of the forum, and the parallel sessions, were devoted to the organization of athletes' commissions, their current structure and best practices in force. With a particular focus on the lives of athletes during the Games, in particular the opening and closing ceremonies and daily life in the Olympic village.
The results ? It's too early to answer. Claudia Bokel, president of the IOC Athletes' Commission and member of the executive board, assured that “the recommendations are the concrete result of lively and constructive debates. » But all of these recommendations will be presented to the IOC Executive Board before being published.
The Singapore Forum was a first for the four new members of the IOC Athletes' Commission, the Slovakian Danka Bartekova, the Australian James Tomkins, the Zimbabwean Kirsty Coventry and the Frenchman Tony Estanguet. A way to prepare them for their very solemn presentation, in front of their colleagues at the Olympic institution, scheduled for July 3 in Lausanne.
As is often the case in such circumstances, the real stakes of the Forum were being played out behind the scenes. At the center of the discussions, the choice of the city for the 2020 Games, that of Jacques Rogge's successor and, of course, that of the sport expected to enter the Olympic program from 2020. Patient lobbying work by the International Federation of wrestling (FILA) had chosen to entrust the Frenchwoman Lise Legrand, Olympic medalist in 2004 in Athens. Vice-president of the French Federation, the young woman has already learned Olympic politics. She was part of the wrestling delegation called to defend the survival of the discipline before the IOC Executive Board at the end of May in Saint Petersburg. With the success that we know.
