The news of the international sports movement experienced little respite and downtime during 2013. Elections, candidacies, events, controversies... FrancsJeux sorted out a particularly large lot. And pulled out of the hat the top 10 men, women, institutions or significant events that made 2013, for us.
No. 10 – Brian Cookson
His year FrancsJeux. In June, the sixty-year-old British rider, a former national level runner in England, announced his candidacy for the presidency of the International Cycling Union. He did it in Paris, in the lounges of a large hotel, a stone's throw from the building in the 9th arrondissement where the UCI was created in April 1900. The English leader challenged the Irishman Pat McQuaid, in office since 2005. For more than three months, the battle between the two candidates fueled the news, against a backdrop of revelations in the Armstrong affair and often dubious maneuvers. On September 27, in Florence, Brian Cookson became the 10th president of the UCI, the second Anglo-Saxon after Pat McQuaid. He was elected by 24 votes to his Irish rival's 18 votes. The Englishman managed to gather the support of the powerful Russian Igor Makarov, the Frenchman David Lappartient (president of the European Cycling Union), the Canadian John Tolkamp and the Australian Klaus Muller.
What awaits him in 2014. A big year. Brian Cookson promised a lot during his campaign. He will now have to show his know-how and move the reform train forward. At the beginning of December, the new president of the UCI took advantage of the annual World Tour seminar to promise teams and peloton organizers that the time had come “to improve the financial performance of professional cycling and its visibility, to make it more attractive. » Then he assured, with a hand on his heart, that cycling was at the start of a new era. It starts in 2014.
