IAAF elections: Sebastian Coe in the hot seat

Beijing: British former Olympic 1500 metres champion runner Sebastian Coe pipped former pole vault world record holder Sergey Bubka of Ukraine in a tight vote to become world athletics chief on Wednesday and vowed “zero tolerance” for drug cheats, who have thrown the sport into turmoil.

 

Coe received 115 votes to Bubka’s 92, and will take over from 82-year-old IAAF president Lamine Diack with the fight against doping at the top of his agenda. 

Coe likened his victory, at an International Associat-ion of Athletics Federations Congress in Beijing, to celebrating the birth of his four children.

 

“For most of us in this room, we would conclude that the birth of our children is a big moment in our lives, probably the biggest,” London-born Coe, 58, said. “But I have to say that being given the opportunity to work with all of you and shape the future of our sport is probably the second biggest and (most) momentous occasion of my life. It’s my sport, it’s my passion and it’s the thing that I’ve always wanted to do,” he said.

 

After a series of doping controversies rocked the build-up to the August 22 to 30 world championships in Beijing, the Briton said he and his new team would be “vigilant” in their crusade against cheats. “There is a zero tolerance to abuse of doping in my sport and I will maintain that to the very highest level of vigilance,” vowed Coe, who won Olympic 1500m golds in the 1980 and 1984 Games.

 

Bubka had also stood for re-election as IAAF vice-president, and was duly voted in to the post along with Qatari Dahlan al-Hamad, Cameroon’s Hamad Kalkaba Malboum and Cuban Alberto Juantorena.