Interview - UK Athletics Chief on London 2017 IAAF World Championships Bid

(ATR) UK Athletics chairman Ed Warner tells Around the Rings that securing the 2017 IAAF World Athletics Championships for London is "absolutely critical" for the future impact of track-and-field in Britain and the U.K.'s place in global athletics.

"We're really grateful of the support we've had from Lamine Diack of the IAAF over the past few years but particularly over the last 12 months in helping us secure the stadium for athletics in legacy mode, and now we've just got to make sure that circle is complete," Warner told ATR.

"For one of the greatest cities in the world not to be able to, whenever the opportunity arises, host the premiere Olympic sport is a crying shame, and it's not just world championships," he added.

"Obviously, that's the pinnacle, but the European championships, area championships, and our own Diamond League meetings..."

Stadium Solution "Unambiguous"

Last month, the Olympic Park Legacy Company ended negotiations with West Ham United, preferred bidder for the 80,000-seat stadium post-Games, because of growing concerns over delays caused by the ongoing legal dispute with rival club Tottenham Hotspur. The stadium, which cost an estimated $760 million, will now remain in public ownership and will be leased out to an anchor tenant following a new tender process.

Warner denied that the collapse of West Ham's Olympic Stadium deal confused legacy discussions. Reassurances were given about the venue's post-Olympics future to the IAAF's inspection team when they visited last month.

"It's completely the opposite of confusing," he said.

"It transforms the landscape for debating the issue of the stadium in that it's unambiguous. It bears no critique or contradiction.

"We've had universally excellent feedback from [IAAF] Council members regarding the developments with the stadium."

Warner explained that the mixed-use plan for the stadium based around football and athletics and other events was more financially viable than the initial plan promised to the IOC during London's bid in 2005. That plan included downsizing the venue to a 25,000-capacity solely for athletics and community events.

"The combination of all of the hospitality options in the stadium 365 days of the year, plus a football team in the winter takes a huge burden off the shoulder of athletics to justify the scale of the facility, so the mixed-use has to be the way forward, and I think a solution's been found here which can make that happen," he said.

London is competing with Doha for the rights to host the 2017 world championships, which will follow the Moscow 2013 and Beijing 2015 events. The IAAF Council will make its decision in Monaco next week.

"No Worries on the Money Front"

Warner said the bid team led by IAAF vice-president and LOCOG chairman Sebastian Coe has been "devoting a lot of energy to talking face-to-face with the people that matter, the 27 people that have a vote".

British Prime Minister David Cameron will offer his full support for London’s bid in a video message to the IAAF Council.

Warner touched on the importance of social media and new media in the IAAF's short bidding cycle for the championships; he knows council members follow them but doesn't think they'll be swayed by Tweets and Facebook campaigns.

He notes the full support of European Athletics president Hansjörg Wirz and other leading figures in the athletics world such as Edwin Moses, the two-time Olympic gold medallist and two-time world champion.

Wirz has said that having supported the efforts of London authorities to retain the track in the Olympic Stadium, "the IAAF must now follow through by awarding the event to justifythe investment and secure the legacy of the London Games".

He also said the IAAF should avoid a situation where the world championships are held outside of Europe three times in four editions.

Warner denied that finance in general and London's 2017 bid budget in particular were not a worry when facing the well-resourced bid from Qatar.

"I've got no worries on the money front for three reasons," he said.

"We've got all the facilities we need, I've got all the government underwritings I need and, most importantly, we've got some very, very persuasive long-term value arguments for the IAAF that say the TV audiences will be higher and the long-term commercial deals should be enhanced.

Warner added: "I can't worry about whether there's any sort of short-term sugar rush that another bidder might be able to give. What I do know is that the long-term commercial arguments are very persuasive in favor of London, and those are the ones that we'll focus on."

Making the Case

Warner said the IAAF Council would next week be presented with "two technically very good bids emotionally two very different bids".

"By that, I mean the appeal to the Council members is strongbut very different for each city. I can imagine what they will be saying about virgin territories for the sport," he went on.

"I know what we'll be saying about making sure that the European heartbeat of the sport is strong and healthy and I know what we'll be saying about the cosmopolitan nature of London and that every one of the 212 member federations has a home crowd here in London," he said.

"We're going to have a full, passionate stadium for morning and evening sessions, all of which I hope will be very appealing to the IAAF from a commercial perspective but also in terms of the interests of the athletes and the interests of the sport."

Last week, London 2017 released a survey by IFM Sports Marketing that identified the British capital as the sporting destination guaranteed to provide the highest return and media profile for sponsors. It claimed more than half of the global industry leaders polled believed London offers the best opportunity to increase new commercial revenues.

The commercial aspects of staging a world champs in London will be driven home time and again in the bid presentation to the IAAF next week.

"One of the critical things that we will emphasize and re-emphasize is the long-term commercial benefits to global athletics of a well-organized, well-attended, mainstream Western world hosting on a frequent basis," Warner said.

"Berlin, we know, did great things for athletics, not just because [Usain] Bolt again did extraordinary things for the second year running, but it was a great championships in a heartland territory.

"In my mind, it would be quite commercially risky for the IAAF to go a stretch from Moscow in 2013 through to potentially 2019 before it comes back to a mature market and a well-developed commercial and television market. We'll play that hard," he emphasized.

Asked what else the bid pitch would include, he added: "We'll play the importance of securing the legacy of the stadium as cementing in with the championships coming here, and we'll emphasize the athlete-centric nature of our bid.

"It's important that athletes break records at a world championships, and I think we've got the circumstances with the crowd, with the time of year, with the climate that will enable them to do that. The sport needs record-breakers to continually reinvent itself and to grow."

Reported by Mark Bisson and Ed Hula

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