The concluding IAAF Press Conference at the IAAF World Championships Moscow 2013 took place before the start of the last day of athletics in the Luzhniki Stadium and the guests on Sunday included IAAF President Lamine Diack and Minister of Sports of Russia and Chairman of the Moscow 2013 Local Organising Committee Vitaly Mutko.

“The IAAF World Championships in Moscow have been a wonderful celebration of athletics, the world has been focused on athletics,” said Diack, reflecting on the last nine days which have showcased the very best athletes in the world.

“The TV data for the opening three days is very encouraging with an increase in the audience on the last World Championships. In 2011, five billion people around the world watched and we are confident that number will be bettered for Moscow.

“Over a quarter of a million stadium spectators have attended the eight evening sessions; adding VIPS, guests, media and athletes then the total audience is over 390,000. Aside from football, no other Olympic sport can attract that number of spectators to a stadium for its World Championships.

“Moscow has again proved we are the most universal of all sports and 203 nations competed, this is a record for the IAAF World Championships. We will leave Moscow with wonderful memories especially of the field events and the relays.

“We have also been active in our fight against cheating to ensure the credibility of the competitions and we are proud to confirm that in Moscow the IAAF have taken close to 1900 blood samples and 100 urine samples in the pre-competition period and 500 in-competition urine samples.

“The Local Organising Committee has provided us with optimum conditions for our congress and championships. I want to thank everybody involved with these championships but especially I wish to thank the thousands of volunteers for giving up their time to make these championships possible.

“Politically, this championship had a record number of participants in the congress and to also have an International Olympic Committee Executive Committee meeting here, before the championships, shows the great respect that this sport and the championships have. Overall, we had 15 ministers of sport here.

“Spasiba Moscow,” concluded the IAAF President.

“It has been an excellent nine day festival of sport. The sprints, the distance events, the jumps, the throws, the walks, have all been outstanding; this signifies that all the disciplines of athletics attracts young people,” commented Mutko.

“I feel we didn’t have any failures, everything worked at a high level. I think new groups of athletics fans were created and the supporters were not just cheering the champions but also the losers.

“This championship has provided an opportunity to promote this sport and the legacy for Moscow is that we hope thousands, hundreds of thousands in fact, will get involved in athletics. We have more than 6000 sports schools in Moscow, and more than 3.5 million children, so there potential is there.

“I don’t think the economic impact on Moscow can be assessed at this stage but it will be positive. I think we responded to what the IAAF wanted, and they have very high demands.

“We also had the Kenyan president here for one day. He was a lucky charm for Russian athletics as we had four medals that night.

“I begged him to stay for another day but he said he had to get back, but shows this sport’s international appeal,” added Mutko with a satisfied smile after Moscow’s Luzhniki Stadium, 33 years after the 1980 Olympic Games, had once again staged a hugely successful global athletics event.

Moscow passes the flag to Beijing

Following the last competition session of Moscow 2013, the traditional handover of the IAAF flag from present Local Organising Committee to the next hosts took place. The 15th edition of the IAAF World Championships will take place in the Chinese capital of Beijing from the 22 to 30 August 2015.

IAAF