ABOUT THE IAAF

A Modern Sport

After 100 years of athletics excellence, the International Association of Athletics Federations is embarking on its second century with drive and determination.

Athletics, a sport that was founded in antiquity, has continued to adapt through the centuries offering a dynamic, life enhancing sport which is ready for the exciting challenges of the next 100 years.

On the 17 July 1912 in Stockholm, Sweden, following the closing ceremony of the Olympic Games in the Swedish capital, the International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF) was founded as the world governing body for the sport of track and field Athletics.

During the ten decades that followed Athletics underwent many changes which reflected the political and socio-economic evolution of the wider world. Even the IAAF’s name changed, in 2001 becoming the ‘International Association of Athletics Federations’ to reflect the growth of a professional sporting world which did not exist in 1912.

The IAAF was founded to fulfil the need for a world governing authority, for a competition programme, for standardised technical equipment and for a list of official World records. All of these requirements remain today.

Yet in an ever faster changing world, international sport federations such as the IAAF need to be pro-active when trying to reach new audiences and find new hosts for their events. But it is also fundamental that we fully understand that athletics is no longer just about high performance, gold medals and records, but also about “sport for all” and about ensuring that the maximum number of citizens are able to participate in Athletics. This means, of course, the thriving world of road running, which is where the majority of people actually connect directly with the world of Athletics, but it is also athletics in schools, where the IAAF is very keen to ensure that we reach the maximum number of kids, all over the world, starting at the age of 7 but also including youngsters in their
teens, where the drop off from sport is most acute.

Despite such inherent benefits the IAAF recognises that Athletics is competing for the public’s attention in an ever more varied and complex media and entertainment driven world but also that we properly embrace matters touching on social responsibility, the environment and all matters that help advance athletics as a force to change the world for good. Athletics disciplines are among the oldest of all sporting competitions known to mankind, with ‘run, jump, throw’ the natural and universal forms of human physical expression. The sport also offers broader values that help us deal with
life’s challenges.

We are also adapting our competition programmes to reflect the increasing diversity of attractions from which the public can now choose. Attracting, and most importantly retaining, the young as both participant and spectator are essential if Athletics is to retain its appeal. But we are also closely linked to the Masters’ Athletics’ movement and also ultra-distance running and mountain racing.

The biennial IAAF World Championships is the jewel of our IAAF World Athletics Series of events which also includes indoor, junior, youth, cross country, race walking and road running during a four year cycle of World Championships and or Cup events for each of these types of competition.

Athletics also carries the mantle of the Olympics Games’ number one sport. Athletics is the main spectator stadium sport of the Games, central to the success of each summer celebration. The histories of Athletics and the Olympic Games are closely entwined and the IAAF is extremely proud of this association.

Both the IAAF World Championships and the Olympic Games continue to play to packed stadiums and attract TV audiences in their billions. The marketing potential of each edition of the IAAF World Championships is excellent with only the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup bigger in terms of global reach and impact. It should be noted that in the next five years the IAAF World Championships will be hosted in three major world capitals, Moscow (2013), Beijing (2015) and London (2017).

The wide variety in the type, size and scope of the rest of the IAAF World Athletics Series of competitions with their different demands in terms of logistics, budget and facilities also means that there are IAAF events available to fit the hosting ambitions and resources of cities, large and small, amongst most of the IAAF’s 212 National Member Federations.

In 2012 for example, the IAAF World Athletics Series of four events commenced with the IAAF World Indoor championships in Istanbul, Turkey, a city which with nine million inhabitants is one of the most populous on the planet, and concluded seven months later with the IAAF World Half Marathon Championships in Kavarna, a Bulgarian Black Sea coastal town whose population does not quite total twelve thousand. Diversity of attraction is the key to the success of the IAAF Competition Programme.

This variety extends beyond Championships. In 2010 a new global one-day competition structure was unveiled headed by the Samsung Diamond League of 14 invitational track and field meetings in Asia, Europe, Middle East, and USA. The IAAF World Challenge which includes meetings across all six IAAF Areas provides the second tier of elite international competition. All these play out to large stadium and TV audiences around the world.

As the IAAF enters its second century of existence, our aim is to further enhance our vibrant sport to offer new and exciting prospects for athletes and spectators alike. We are working hard to ensure that every area of our sport is reviewed, tested and encouraged to strive for athletics excellence.


Lamine Diack
IAAF President