COSTA NAVARINO, March 20, 2025 - Seven months after declaring that “new times are calling for new leaders” – while holding back tears, outgoing IOC President Thomas Bach has today (March 20) named his successor, following a vote by the IOC membership.

In what was a historic moment for the Olympic Movement on 20 March in Costa Navarino, Greece, Kirsty Coventry became the first woman and African to be elected as leader of the world’s most powerful organisation. She won by a large margin in the first round of voting on Thursday to become the 10th IOC president in the 130-year history of the Olympic body, whose roots date back almost 3000 years.

SIGNAL OF UNITY Speaking to the press immediately after the election, Bach congratulated his successor, adding that her victory in the first round is a clear indication of unity of the Olympic Movement. “It is a surprise, but it is a strong signal of the unity of the Olympic Movement. I did not manage to win in the first round at the time,” Bach said, while insisting that he did not have a preferred candidate. 

On August 10, 2024, in an emotional 13-minute speech delivered on the last day of the 142nd IOC Session in Paris, Bach humbly declined a rare opportunity to extend his mandate beyond 2025, despite having the backing of several IOC members. “After 12 years in the office of IOC President our organization is best served with a change in leadership,” Bach said, in Paris.

Today, the German, who was the first Olympic champion to become the IOC president, has unveiled his “best possible successor”.

“She has the support of the IOC membership, you saw the reaction there in the room. And now I will invite her for a three month period of transition in the administration. We have everything prepared for this. Now it is up to her to accept and in which format to accept this invitation so that she can take over on the 24th of June well prepared and can start working because Milano Cortina does not wait.” 

FIRST FEMALE Although Coventry’s election is a key milestone in the Olympic Movement, Bach has stressed that her victory was not because she was the only female candidate in the record field of seven.

“You have seen a campaign with different proposals, with different approaches and you have a clear vote on these different proposals. I don’t think that this was a vote on women against men or the other way around. There were the manifestos, there were the presentations in Lausanne and now the voters have made their judgement. The most important thing is to have a personality with leadership qualities. A personality which is reflecting the opinion and the values of the IOC session, of the IOC members, and a personality which is able to unify, and this is what Kirsty Coventry has done today with these 49 votes.

“I have spoken to some of the other candidates and they said they are ready to support her. That is the Olympic spirit. Like all the other candidates she has experience. She has been sitting in the IOC executive board for quite some years. She was chairing the athletes commission at very troubled times with the athletes. She’s been a successful minister for a couple of years so she has leadership experience. And what I am offering to her is what I had offered to all the other candidates. Yesterday I sent an email to all the seven candidates saying I would like to have breakfast with whoever wins on Friday morning so that we can start talking and to see how we shape this transition period.

“This was an extremely fair election. The same procedures were applied for all the candidates. There is a good democratic rule, when you don’t win an election, don’t blame the voters and don’t blame the procedure,” said Bach. 

HONORARY PRESIDENT The German lawyer decided to also step down as an IOC member after his presidency comes to an end on 23 June 2025, the day he will handover to Coventry. He tendered his resignation to the IOC EB last month, even though there are still nine more years before he reaches the age limit of 80 (for those elected before December 1999).

From becoming an Olympic champion to serving as the ninth IOC president, Bach built an enviable legacy in the Olympic Movement for almost five decades, and on the first day of the 144th IOC Session he was elected as an IOC honorary president. Bach became an Olympic champion in fencing at the Montreal 1976 Games, then he was an athletes’ representative at the Olympic Congress in Baden-Baden in 1981 and a founding member of the IOC Athletes’ Commission. He was elected as an IOC Member in 1991, and as a member of the IOC Executive Board in 1996, and served as an IOC Vice-President for more than 10 years. He has also chaired several IOC commissions. On 10 September 2013, he became the ninth President of the IOC and was re-elected for a second four-year term on 10 March 2021. Yesterday the IOC members hailed the sweeping reforms by the Bach administration which has, among other things, ensured financial stability and growth, with commercial revenues up by 60 per cent since 2012.