NEW YORK (AP) — Sebastian Coe would love to see a cross-country running race brought back to the Olympics at the 2030 Winter Games.
The president of World Athletics has long argued for the event's inclusion in the Olympics, but he said the willingness of new IOC president Kirsty Coventry to explore ways of doing things has helped.
“The new president is clear they want to put everything on the table at the moment,” Coe told The Associated Press in an interview
Saturday. “It’s a very different atmosphere. It’s very much how can we improve together rather than we’ll tell you how to do it. She’s blown some oxygen into the organization.”
Coe said he's discussed bringing the event in for the 2030 Winter Olympics in the French Alps, or possibly in Salt Lake City four years later.
Cross country was in the Summer Olympics until 1924, when it was removed because of harsh conditions at the Paris Games that caused extreme exhaustion from the heat and the course. Adding it to the Winter Games would alleviate those issues and would also go a long way to including more countries, especially African nations who would potentially excel at the sport.
“Winter Games aren't African. It doesn't scream African," said Coe, who was in the U.S. for Sunday's New York City Marathon. "So I think it was a good opportunity.”
For cross country to be eventually included again, Coe said there would have to be a simple Olympic charter amendment that says that a sport practiced in the winter would be eligible to be in the program.
It helps that he's on the IOC's new Olympic program working group that has been charged with looking at the size of the event and ways for sports to be added or removed and whether traditional sports in each Olympics could cross over.
Track is moving to the first week of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics and Coe is in favor of that. The exact schedule hasn't been figured out yet.
“We still have the timetable to work on and there are lots of things," Coe said. "But starting off with a big moment that is athletics in an Olympic Games quickly off the back of what we know is LA and an opening ceremony that will be jaw dropping because that's what they do really well.”
Coe has fond memories of Los Angeles, where he ran in the 1984 Olympics and set the 1,500-meter games record while winning the gold medal.
“It was a great games. I always look at LA in '84 as being really the first of the modern games. You know, that’s not to dismiss the contribution that the games have made up to that point. But Peter (Ueberroth) has changed the landscape because he had to, and, you know, there were many of the things that LA pioneered.”
Coe cited broadcasting rights, sponsorships and venue sustainability as key things that the California city started.
A new event next year called RUN X was announced earlier this week. The world treadmill championship will have a series of qualifying 5K events that will culminate in a championship. The top 10 male and 10 female competitors from the qualifying rounds will advance to a live final late next year.
“Harnessing technology and growing the global running community and building that bridge between world athletics and what they do,” Coe said. “We'll have age group world championships, regionally, nationally and then a world championship in an iconic venue.”
Coe was excited for the first Ultimate Championships that is less than a year away in Budapest. The three-day event from Sept. 11-13 will showcase Olympic, world and Diamond League champions over three evening sessions.
“It’s a world championship in three days, three hours a night, unashamedly aimed at TV,” he said.
They'll only be semifinals and finals in most track events and only eight participants in each field event.
Coe said World Athletics is giving all the ticket and sponsorships to the host city.
“There's a real incentive to make this work in a local level,” he said.
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