Meet the Non-Candidates for IOC President: Rene Fasel

(ATR) Around the Rings interviews possible candidates for the IOC presidency – today, Rene Fasel of Switzerland.

Our series includes interviews with four (so far) of the most-mentioned possible contenders to succeed Jacques Rogge next year. None of the four has yet to declare anything more than an interest in considering a run for the post. Formal notice is due in June 2013.

Along with Fasel, the series this week features interviews with Thomas Bach (Aug. 20), Rene Fasel, Richard Carrion and Ser Miang Ng. All were conducted in London during the Olympic Games.

All gingerly stepped around their current status as non-candidates. IOC rules for the campaign put a damper on public debate and statements outside of a manifesto for IOC members to review.

Fasel, 62, an IOC member since 1995, is also the president of the International Ice Hockey Federation. He has served on the IOC Executive Board since 2008 as president of the Association of International Olympic Winter Sports Federations. He also led the IOC Coordination Commission for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games.

Around the Rings:First, your impression of London?

Rene Fasel: I’m amazed. I didn’t expect such a success, especially on the spectator side. The venues are brilliant.

We went to the temple for cricket, Lord’s. And then to beach volleyball at Horse Guards, Greenwich, Wimbledon, Wimbledon, Wimbledon – le catédral! The cathedral of tennis! And you are there? I mean, I’m watching and I’m a great fan of tennis, I’m a great fan of Federer, that’s why I asked to give the medal. I wake up at 3 in the morning when there’s the U.S. Open to watch him.

In the catédral, and you sit in the Royal Box. And only Royals can give the trophy in Wimbledon, and you give the medal! This is amazing. I’m very much impressed. The fair play of the spectators, the venues, the location of the venues...it makes you forget all the traffic problems.

But I decided to go mostly [on the] Underground. You have to walk a little bit, but even sitting in the Underground and watching people, I love that too. Watching the people, how some they sleep, some they discuss and you see really how they live. For me, it’s a unique opportunity to really experience this great city.

ATR: And what do you think of the performance of Team GB? The fact that they’ve won so many medals, gold medals as well? Do you think they’re making the most of home court advantage, home field advantage?

RF: This is the magic of organizing Olympic Games. It gives you a huge momentum in the country for sport, especially for summer sport, so when the IOC decided seven years ago to give the Games to London, the athletes here from all the different sports they knew that it’s a great opportunity for them to be at home and compete in the Olympic Games. So they’re really prepared for that.

They had seven years. Seven years not only to make the construction, seven years is also to prepare the athletes and they did that in a very nice way and you see the results. It’s unbelievable.

ATR: What do you think about the placement of the Olympic cauldron inside the stadium?

RF: Yes, that’s a little bit disappointing. I think we shouldn’t accept that. It’s a very, very strong symbol of the Games, the flame.

I was running with the Torch on Oxford Street. I never had that, even in Vancouver, I didn’t have that.

Thousands of people, you know? And you have the Torch, and then suddenly the Flame disappeared.

Where is the Flame? Where is the Flame? People called me saying "Rene, where is the Flame?" I said: "I’m sorry, I don’t know". But there is no Flame there. They put it in the stadium, hiding it, I would say. We shouldn’t accept that.

I was really sorry for a lot of people. I had people coming for the first week to London to watch the opening and them being in the Park and saying: "Now where is the Flame? Where is the Flame?" No Flame. So that’s a pity.

ATR:For all the worries people had about traffic and transport potentially being a problem, it seems to have gone very well.

RF:In the beginning, it was a little bit difficult, but it’s always like this. You know the issues you always have in the Games are transportation, accommodation, security, and budget. This is always a challenge for all the organizers in Winter Games and in Summer Games.

With the transportation, you have a city like it is, you cannot change that city – this is a big city with very small roads and not easy to go through.

The budget, we know they started with four times the budget, so this is an issue we the IOC should really be considering. If we continue like this, only a few countries will be able to organize Games. How should the size of the Games of the future be?

And as for security, I was really very much pleased about the volunteers. They are very, very, very friendly and the security is tough, but it’s much more, I would say, nicer than in the airports. In the airports, people shout at you: "Belt! Watch!" Bim bam, you know. Rough. But here people are "oh sir, can you take off your watch? or your belt?" or "how are you, did you enjoy the Games?" It’s friendly. I mean, the bag and mag is done in a very clever way.

ATR: What about Sochi, particularly the still-pending decision about what to do with the NHL players? Is this now becoming more of an issue, more of a problem?

RF: No, I think the message I get from the players is that they want to go to Sochi. And today, as you know, they have a Collective Bargaining Agreement for the moment. The owners, they made the offer to the players and were rejected, so I don’t know if we will have a lockout. Some people say yes, some people say no.

And NHL commissioner Gary Bettman made it quite clear. There are different, for them, important issues than just going to the Games. It’s more a money issue they have, sharing the revenues. When you have a lot of money, it’s not always good, so I would say the CBA and this discussion about going to Sochi or not is not very high on the agenda.

I think in the end the owners and the players will come to Sochi. And if they are not coming, our door is wide open, please, any players.

ATR:And it could be NHL players?

RF: Yes, if they want to come, they come.

ATR:Sochi 2014 CEO Dmitry Chernyshenko says the OCOG has done everything for the NHL in terms of being able to provide accommodations, transportation for families, the whole package, so that everybody’s comfortable there. Is there much more that Sochi as an organizing committee can do to sweeten it, to make it attractive for NHL players?

RF: Actually, when we decided to have the NHL in Nagano, accommodation was a huge challenge for us because the decision was maybe a little bit late and the logistics to bring the people over to Japan was not easy.

It’s the same here. One of the challenges will be to bring the people over to Sochi. As Gary [Bettman] always wants to play the weekend before, he will never give us three weekends, so we have to bring them when they play on Monday.

Transportation will be easy because the Village is always near the Olympic Park. It’s the first time we will have the competitions in an Olympic Park like Sochi with figure skating, curling, ice hockey and all the ice sports in one place. I expect to have between 70,000 and 200,000 people being in the Olympic Park. It will be very special for all the athletes there.

ATR: The IOC Executive Board must recommend a sport to be cut from the program next February. This is going to be one of the more difficult decisions that you have to deal with. How is this decision going to be made?

RF: You know Samaranch used to say "the bus is full". So we would love to have maybe a bigger bus, maybe a second bus. As you know a lot of federations, a lot of sports would love to come to be in the Olympic program, so on one side we have to fight against gigantism.

For sure, now in the near future, I mean right now, we have to take the decision if we’re going to take one sport out or not. Based on criteria. I was really impressed by the criteria set by the IOC administration about TV, about everything, the criteria about the different sports, TV audiences and impact and cost and everything.

So if the decision will be made to exclude one of the sports, it will be done on a very fair basis, I hope, because we will have the criteria to do so.

But in the near future, we should really sit together and have a very deep discussion how could we reorganize the whole Olympic program, the Games, I would say, just the Games, the size of the Games, the number of athletes, the number of sports, how we could change that a little bit. I think we cannot expect in the future that people will put $10, $15, $20 billion to organize Games.

Then maybe we have China, Russia, the U.S. and that’s it, and the economy we have now in the world tells you "hey, guys, be careful". You know? We need really to do something.

ATR:Any chance of looking at moving anything from the summer program to the winter program?

RF: That would be very difficult because we struggle with accommodation in winter, we struggle with venues. So if you have an indoor sport, I speak all about basketball, handball, I mean a lot of sports are indoor sports in summer, you could do that in winter, too. But you would overload the organizer to add some sports like handball, basketball, like this.

ATR:Now, another big step for the IOC next year is selecting a new president. And I hear that you’re seriously considering running for president – what do you say to that?

RF: No, some people are approaching me and asking me what I’m thinking on that. First of all, I have to be re-elected [as IIHF president] in September in Tokyo.

I will have my general congress in September in Tokyo to be re-elected for another four-year term, and there’s still one year to go, so I’m thinking.

It’s an interesting time the next year, the coming year, so I will make my decision one day to say "no" or "yes" for sure.

Some people talk about Denis Oswald. Denis is my older brother, so he has the priority if he wants to run.

And then I have to see, you know? I have advantages and disadvantages. I’m a sportsman, so I have a big passion for the Olympic Games, the Olympic Movement. This is my life. But we will see. I don’t say no, I don’t say yes. We will see.

ATR: The Executive Board has nine new members this time? Nine new faces? It’s a new-look EB. Is that going to make any difference in how it works over the next few years?

RF: No, I think Jacques [Rogge] will finish his mandate.

I mean he always says, well I hear he says, that he will definitely not make big changes his last year, he will leave that to his successor. He will end this mandate in a very smooth way.

I expect in the next year we will have some very interesting discussion in the EB because of the different candidates. I mean, most of the potential candidates are EB members.

You know what? I am really looking forward with a lot of interest to how things are going to move and what the discussion will be. And Jacques will be, knowing Jacques how he is, he will just step a little bit back and watch and listen. It will be very interesting.

ATR: You don’t think he’s going to get involved in terms of trying to shape the election?

RF: It’s not his character. He has a very interesting style of leadership, so it’s not his style, his character to go and maybe try to interfere or discuss. I don’t know, I don’t think so. Actually, he said that openly that he will not play a role in this discussion, so we will see. Actually a very, very interesting year to come. Very much.

Conducted in London by Ed Hula.