Sergei Bubka, his probable future rival in the race for the presidency of the IAAF, has been warned: Sebastian Coe has gone to great lengths to succeed Lamine Diack at the head of world athletics. The Briton launched his presidential campaign on Wednesday December 3 in London. And he set the tone. There is no question for the Olympic middle-distance champion to take it slowly. Sebastian Coe wants to deploy the big artillery.
Let's quickly go over his program. As one might expect, it presents itself as a clever mix of new ideas and sure values. Creative without being too mind-blowing. The opposite would have been a surprise. Sebastian Coe wants to reform the calendar, convinced that “the public does not understand when the season starts and when it ends, why it constantly moves from the United States to Europe and Asia. » Before promising “a harmonized calendar, key to promotion and marketing. »
It also wishes to offer athletics closer to the public, particularly young people, by bringing them to the heart of the urban environment. He cites the example of the CityGames in Newcastle, where “there were thousands of people massed in the streets along the sprint lanes or around the pole vault”. And explains his idea: “We reach young people more easily when the athletic dimension is visually related to the length of a store facade or the height of a bus. »
Finally, the former boss of the 2012 London Games intends to increase the resources allocated to the fight against doping, and give more weight to athletes in internal debates at the IAAF. Not bad.
More interesting: the campaign itself. To win, Sebastian Coe put in place a communications plan worthy of an Olympic bid. He surrounded himself with an expert, his compatriot Mike Lee, the founder and boss of the English agency Vero Communications. Known as the white wolf in the Olympic universe, Mike Lee advised the victorious bids of Rio for the 2016 Games, PyeongChang for those of 2018, Buenos Aires for the Youth Games in 2018. He was also on the campaign, much more troubled, from Qatar for the Football World Cup in 2022. Mike Lee also accompanied Bernard Lapasset, the president of the IRB, in his patient lobbying work to have rugby sevens accepted in the Olympic program. More recently, he was alongside Brian Cookson in his completely successful attempt to win the presidency of the International Cycling Union.
With such an advisor, Sebastian Coe advances his pieces like a strategist. He first announced his candidacy in the daily Team, last week, in order to immediately give itself an international dimension. Then he published a column in the Daily Telegraph, Tuesday December 2, before presenting to the press, the next day, his “manifesto” for the future of the IAAF. Very to the point, his campaign team sent the main points of the document to the international press on Wednesday morning, asking to respect an embargo. Later in the day, she closed the deal by transmitting to the media the entire presentation made by Sebastian Coe at a press conference.
This was to be expected: the Briton has created an official website, sebcoe2015.org. Entirely dedicated to the campaign for the presidency of the IAAF, it completely details its program and its journey. A model of its kind, available in English, French, Spanish and… Russian. A nod to Sergei Bubka?
