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≡ IOC EXECUTIVE BOARD ≡
“Only one real decision, and this was about putting boxing on the program of the Olympic Games in L.A. 2028, after the provisional recognition of World Boxing in February.”
International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach (GER) summed up Monday’s IOC Executive Board meeting with that announcement, adding:
“I am very confident that the Session will approve it, that all the boxers of the world have certainty that they can participate in the Olympic Games L.A. 2028 if – if – their national federation is recognized by World Boxing.”
This confirms LA28 as the largest Olympic Games in history as to the number of sports, with 36, compared to 33 at Tokyo 2020 and 32 at Paris 2024.
World Boxing currently has 84 member federations and IOC Sports Director Kit McConnell (NZL) said he expects the approval by the Session “to be an acceleration of the number of national federations joining” World Boxing, with the real deadline for participation “to be members at the time of the qualification events.”
Looking to the next Games in Milan Cortina next February, Bach noted:
“We also heard a very precise, very encouraging, promising report about Milano Cortina 2026, in particular with regard to the very successful test events which were highly appreciated by the participating athletes and also by the respective International Federations.”
He also expressed satisfaction that 600,000 tickets – out of 1.5 million – have already been sold, and that more than 100,000 applications for the 18,000 volunteer slots for the Games have been received.
Bach was asked about the new agreement with Comcast-NBC, announced last week, with a $3 billion commitment for the period 2033-36:
“This contract with Comcast-NBC is the result of a negotiation which is going on for, I think, almost a year, if not more than a year and where the Executive Board has always been informed about the process, and the progress of these negotiations.
“We could, with this, ensure for the financial stability, we could also ensure that in the United States, that the audience in the United States could fully benefit from the experience of Comcast-NBC. This is why these negotiations, all the time, then also the signature of the agreement was very much supported by the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee.”
Bach also updated the financial report for the IOC: $7.7 billion in revenue for 2021-24, now $7.5 billion already secured for 2025-28, $6.7 billion for 2029-32 and $4 billion for 2033-36. He observed that commercial revenues advanced by 60% during his term. Also:
“If you look at the overall environment, and if I look at my colleagues in other international organizations, they have to face significant declines, with the exception of FIFA. But if you look at all the U.N. organizations and other [non-governmental organizations] like the IOC, I don’t think they can demonstrate such a financial stability.”
On Russia, Bach explained the situation is fairly simple:
“We have always maintained contacts on the working level, not on my level or the level of the Executive Board, but on the working level, the contacts have always been maintained, there is nothing to report on this. So there can be no results on the working level.
“The conditions [for return] are very clear: they have to follow the rules. Everybody in the Olympic Movement who is following the rules of the Olympic Charter is welcome and everybody who is not following the Olympic Charter is not welcome. So, the ball is in the court of the Russian Olympic Committee.”
On the transition period for the new President, who will take over on 24 June, Bach explained this was a reaction to his experience upon his election in 2013:
“I arrived in Lausanne and there was no transition. And this was a situation I did not appreciate, and therefore I made the proposal to the Executive Board to have this transition time as an offer to the President-elect, to come to [Lausanne] to become familiar with the management, with the people, which – I knew the top [people] – not the rest, to become familiar with the working mechanisms” and so on. He compared it to similar situations in business and other governments.
Finally, he expressed satisfaction that he is leaving with the Olympic Movement in better shape than he found it:
“I think my successor is facing less uncertainty then what I had to face when I started my mandate. … This is the first period during my presidency that I do not have an existential problem for the Olympic Movement or the Olympic Games on my desk.”
He cast aside any suggestion that he has been supporting Kirsty Coventry (ZIM) as the next IOC President.
The IOC will formally open the 144th Session on Tuesday in ancient Olympia, then return for the first day of meetings on Wednesday. The Presidential election is on Thursday afternoon.
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