Tomas Bach is coming to his term limit next year as President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC). One of the seven people vying for his position is incumbent IOC Vice President Juan Antonio Samaranch, the son of the former IOC President by the same name who led the organization between 1980 and 2001.
Mr Samaranch was recently in Budapest for an international forum for sports leaders. After the event he talked to former Hungarian gymnastics champion, Olympian, television presenter, and lawyer Zsuzsa Csisztu. The interview was published in the Hungarian sports daily Nemzeti Sport.
During the discussion, Mr Samaranch reflected on the tumultuous time the Tokyo Olympics had to be held, with a one-year delay in 2021, without any fans in the stadiums, in the middle of the dreaded COVID-19 pandemic. He added the summer games before that, in Rio de Janeiro in 2016, also had problems of its own due to the economic and public safety issues of the host nation Brazil. In comparison to that, the Paris Games this summer gave ‘the energy input and optimism’ the Olympic movement really needed, as Mr Samaranch put it, for which he thanked the French government for assisting.
‘The Paris Games this summer gave “the energy input and optimism” the Olympic movement really needs’
Ms Csisztu asked the speaker about the controversial case of Imane Khelif, the boxer from Algeria who won the gold in the 66-kg (145 pounds) women’s boxing event, despite having been born with male chromosomes.
Samaranch stressed that ‘This is not a so-called transgender case…These athletes were raised as women and have always competed as women,’ but then added: ‘As of now, it is always the duty of the international sports associations to protect the biological women in their respective sports…However, I believe we have come up with a holistic solution to the problem which protects biological women from unfair competition.’
‘Would anyone be surprised if Budapest, Hungary made a bid for the hosting of the Olympics? I don’t think anyone would be'
He then went on to praise Hungary for the organization of major sporting events in recent years, such as the World Athletics Championships in 2023, the World Aquatics Championships in 2022, as well as multiple games for the UEFA European Championship in 2021.
‘Would anyone be surprised if Budapest, Hungary would make a bid for the hosting of the Olympics? I don’t think anyone would be,’ he concluded his interview.
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