Athletics Legend Sebastian Coe Vies With Six Rivals For IOC Presidency

World Athletics chief Sebastian Coe is the highest profile of the seven candidates to have declared on Monday their bid to succeed International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach. Coe will face stiff opposition from, amongst others, Kirsty Coventry, bidding to become the first woman and African to head the IOC, and cycling boss David Lappartient. The charismatic Briton, a two-time Olympic 1500 metres champion, also has challenges due to the rules laid down last week by the IOC Ethics Commission. Coe turns 68 on September 29 and although there is room for manoeuvre to raise the retirement age of IOC members and presidents to 74 he will be older than that come the end of an eight-year mandate.

The election will be at the IOC Session in Athens, which runs from March 18-21 next year.

Bach, 70, is standing down after serving 12 years. The German announced at the end of the Paris Games that he would not be seeking another term.

The other four candidates include two from Asia -- another continent never to have had an IOC president -- Jordan's Prince Faisal al-Hussein and gymnastics chief Morinari Watanabe.

Juan Antonio Samaranch Junior, whose father of the same name was IOC president from 1980-2001 and transformed it into a commercial powerhouse, and a surprise entrant, ski federation president Johan Eliasch, round up the candidates.

Under the election rules Coe, Eliasch, Lappartient and Watanabe will all have to resign as heads of their respective federations and seek re-election as individual members at the Athens Session.

First up for the septet is presenting their respective programmes to the IOC members at the turn of the year.

"The candidates will present their programmes, in camera, to the full IOC membership on