How Lord Seb Coe is gearing up for the hardest race of his life: Inside the secretive and unusual battle to succeed Thomas Bach as IOC president, writes RIATH AL-SAMARRAI
- The seven candidates to replace Thomas Bach gathered in Lausanne on Thursday
- They’ll address members of the IOC en masse ahead of March’s presidential vote
- A Jordanian prince and Zimbabwean sports minister are among the candidates
If the cardinals of the Vatican thought they cornered the market on secretive elections, then perhaps they had not factored on how the International Olympic Committee choose their president.
The key staging post in that battle will play out here in Lausanne on Thursday, where the seven candidates to replace Thomas Bach, including Lord Sebastian Coe, have gathered for their sole opportunity to address the members of the IOC en masse before March’s vote.
For Coe, it is the toughest race of his life and certainly the strangest, given the stringency of the rules for those running, with the cast including a Jordanian prince, the son of a former IOC ruler and Zimbabwean sports minister. The quirks of the process are quite startling.
For one, the cohort has been banned from holding debates or offering any critique of a rival’s policies across the past two months. In Lausanne, the oddities extend further to the regulations around the all-important speeches to the members.
Upon arrival at Olympic House from 9am onwards, each of the seven will be required to hand over their phones before they are escorted to a private room with up to three aides. When it is their turn to speak, they will then be led to the auditorium and given a rigid 15-minute window to sell their candidacy – what they say and how well they say it will be a mystery to the outside world, as filming is strictly prohibited, as are journalists.
For an organisation that has long faced criticisms for its lack of transparency, it would seem Bach was in no mood to improve perceptions on his way out of the IOC door. One of the candidates, Prince Feisal of Jordan, has already broken ranks to condemn the nature of the process.
![Lord Sebastian Coe's campaign to be named the new IOC president is not only the toughest race of his life so far - it is also the strangest given the stringency of the rules for those running](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2025/01/29/18/94648583-14339127-image-a-3_1738174127251.jpg)
Lord Sebastian Coe’s campaign to be named the new IOC president is not only the toughest race of his life so far – it is also the strangest given the stringency of the rules for those running
![](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2025/01/29/18/94648799-14339127-image-m-12_1738174559414.jpg)
The seven candidates to replace Thomas Bach (above), including Coe, have gathered for their sole opportunity to address the members of the IOC en masse before March’s vote
![French president of world cycling David Lappartient is among the list of runners and riders](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2025/01/29/18/94648645-14339127-image-a-6_1738174236703.jpg)
French president of world cycling David Lappartient is among the list of runners and riders
He said: ‘Personally I wish there was more transparency and openness. If we’re looking at the most powerful job in sport, then the world should understand who the people who are running are. I would prefer that we would present and the whole world would see.’
Coe’s challenge here is to win over a room that is not universally in favour of his brand of reform politics. It is widely accepted that his CV, from Olympian to the orchestrator of London 2012 and the president of World Athletics, is the best in the field by a distance.
He also has a proven history of big calls from his time running athletics – banning Russia, favouring science over ideology in the gender row and awarding prize money to Olympic medallists were all bold, decisive steps.
However, he has made a big play on being the change candidate and the inferred criticisms of the status quo have not gone unnoticed.
Bach, in particular, is not a Coe fan, with his private blessing given to the Zimbabwean sports minister and gold-medal winning swimmer Kirsty Coventry. The favourite is Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr of Spain, with all the connotations of nepotism that come with being the son of a man who ran the movement for 21 years.
Given Coe is a notoriously canny operator in the political sphere, it is highly unlikely he would have staked his reputation if he felt this was a lost cause.
His private canvassing of opinion among the members in the past months has no doubt fostered an internal sense that he can win, but in such a slippery environment much can go wrong.
Completing the list of runners and riders in Switzerland are David Lappartient, the French president of world cycling, Morinari Watanabe, the Japanese president of international gymnastics, and Johan Eliasch, the British-Swedish president of Ski and Snowboard.