A cornerstone of the global sporting calendar that resonates far beyond the track or the pool, the Olympics now finds itself at the centre of a power struggle that is likely to define global politics for decades to come.
The winner, whoever it is, has never been more important. They will preside over the Olympic Games at a time when its future is more precarious than ever.
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The chief agents of that threat? Vladimir Putin, and by extension, Donald Trump.
Their testimony paints a murky picture of a future where power and politics come first, and sport very much second.
“In his own mind, he probably thinks he was born for this role,” says Ed Warner, who was head of UK Athletics for 10 years and worked closely with Coe throughout that time, including during London 2012 and on the bid to host the World Athletics Championships in 2017.
It certainly does feel like the moment up to which Coe’s career has been leading. He is many things to many people: a certain generation fondly recall his middle-distance rivalry with Steve Ovett and his two gold medals in 1980 and 1984; to another, his loss of a Conservative seat in Cornwall was up there with the “Portillo moment” of Tony Blair’s landslide victory in 1997.
Sebastian Coe won 1500m gold at the 1980 and 1984 Olympics (Photo: Getty)He is not the only athlete in the running: one of his two main rivals is Kirsty Coventry, Africa’s most decorated Olympian with seven swimming medals – two of which were gold. Now the sports minister in her home country of Zimbabwe, she is the rumoured choice of outgoing president Bach.
“She’s stuck betwixt and between,” one source says. “She is not recent enough an athlete to win the support of athletes, and not retired long enough to have amassed the kind of political heft required for the job. It’s hard to see her winning.”
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Samaranch Jr is not a complete “nepo baby” though; he is the current IOC vice-president and has served on countless sub-committees, but no one doubts that at least some votes for Jr will be cast out of loyalty to Sr.
“But it is so duplicitous. People will promise votes to whoever is in front of them at the time.”
Sport and politics do mix
“That is naivety personified,” Coe said, when Piers Morgan put to him that politics and sport don’t, and in fact shouldn’t, mix.
“Politics is the stuff of life, sport is the stuff of life. Actually if we’re smart in sport you should be forging even closer political relationships.”
“It’s far better to have people in your sport rather than sitting outside it”.
Lord Sebastian Coe discusses Russia’s future involvement in athletics if a peace deal with Ukraine is found.
Watch the full interview at 3pm (EST) / 8pm (UK).@piersmorgan | @sebcoe pic.twitter.com/Kg5pdcaawV
— Piers Morgan Uncensored (@PiersUncensored) February 20, 2025
It is ironic then that Coe has been the chief thorn in the side of Putin’s attempts to use sport to advance his disruption of the global order.
It was Coe who, as head of World Athletics, banned Russia from competing in the sport most central to the Olympic Games, and was seen to lead the charge on the country’s state-sponsored doping regime.
But as so often with Coe, there are two sides to his stance. In the wake of the Russian doping scandal, he founded the Athletics Integrity Unit to try and bring the country into line.
Sebastian Coe is one the contenders for the IOC presidency (Photo: Getty)
Process is a word he has leaned hard on in this campaign, trying to paint himself as the arch-technocrat, perhaps because in the hyper-conservative IOC, Coe has previously ruffled more than a few feathers by being prepared to speak his mind.
And that includes Putin, the man who poses such a serious threat to the Olympic Games.
“And the reason for saying this is that we now know that Putin has this concept of a World Friendship Games. We’re led to believe that there are 76 countries who have already indicated they will participate.
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The IOC has already told its members that participating in the World Friendship Games would go “against the Olympic Movement’s collective aim of maintaining the independence and autonomy of sport”.
It seems like a weak move, but shifting sands in the Middle East, an increasingly influential player on the Olympic scene, represent an opportunity.
“No tax, no regulation, no scrutiny. And the Emiratis have already said ‘We are looking to attract sports governing bodies to locate here’.
It would be a power play to which the new IOC president, whoever it is, would have to respond, with the choice simple: let Russia back into its Games, or start a fight against a new competitor.
“Now, we’re in a completely different era, completely different period in the history of sport.”
The Trump dilemma
As the man overseeing the next summer Games in Los Angeles, he will add another layer of jeopardy to an already-precarious tightrope walk for the new IOC president.
Trump even called Zelensky a “dictator” at one point, before holding direct talks with the Russian president, who has effectively ruled for 25 years, over the phone.
Vladimir Putin poses a serious threat to the Olympic Games (Photo: Reuters)“Where we’re heading to right now with sport is rather than a rules-based global sporting order, we’re heading towards a deals-based global sporting order,” Chadwick says.
He adds: “So the harsh reality for the new IOC president is that you might want to be a fine, upstanding, moral individual who sticks to the rules, but the reality of 21st century geopolitics is that deals are more significant than rules.”
But Trump will doubtless want the LA Games to be a celebration of his diplomatic genius, with Russian, Belarusian and Ukrainian athletes competing alongside each other, watched on by the outgoing American president, his successor and the readmitted Putin, scenes unthinkable even a year ago.
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Does the IOC really want to cause an international incident and start what Trump will certainly make a public dispute over the participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes?
“I think the history of the IOC is it does what it wants to do, and Thomas Bach, when pressured to explain himself, has often been absent. He’s spoken when he’s fancied speaking,” Warner says.
“And who are the IOC to try and extend the punishment of Russia? The leader of the free world has deemed [Russia] to be an acceptable negotiating partner.
“It might feel incredibly unsavoury, but I just don’t see the IOC standing against geopolitics.”
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