{"id":795004,"date":"2019-04-19T16:32:00","date_gmt":"2019-04-19T22:32:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.summitdaily.com\/news\/ioc-resists-change-to-rule-limiting-athlete-sponsors\/"},"modified":"2019-04-19T16:32:00","modified_gmt":"2019-04-19T22:32:00","slug":"ioc-resists-change-to-rule-limiting-athlete-sponsors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/local-news\/ioc-resists-change-to-rule-limiting-athlete-sponsors\/","title":{"rendered":"IOC resists change to rule limiting athlete sponsors"},"content":{"rendered":"
International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach from Germany speaks at the opening of the first day of the executive board meeting of the International Olympic Committee in Lausanne, Switzerland on March 26.<\/strong>
Laurent Gillieron \/ AP | Keystone<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

LAUSANNE, Switzerland \u2014 Amid International Olympic Committee resistance to athlete activism, Olympic competitors have been urged to negotiate with national officials directly if they want to gain freedoms to promote their personal sponsors during Summer and Winter Games.<\/p>\n

IOC President Thomas Bach\u2019s comments to an invited audience of athletes on Sunday confirmed the Olympic body will not extend worldwide the concessions won by German athletes in a recent federal government ruling.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no \u2018one size fits all\u2019 solution,\u201d Bach said when asked by a Canadian delegate about changing Olympic Charter Rule 40, which limits athletes\u2019 commercial rights during official games periods<\/p>\n

Rule 40 states \u201cno competitor \u2026 may allow his person, name, picture or sports performances to be used for advertising purposes during the Olympic Games\u201d without an official exemption.<\/p>\n

The German anti-trust office in February described the rule as \u201ctoo far-reaching \u2026 abusive conduct\u201d when the Olympic Games represented the most marketable time in many athletes\u2019 careers.<\/p>\n

The rule protects exclusivity for Olympic sponsors, such as Coca-Cola, Proctor & Gamble and Toyota, and drives up the IOC\u2019s revenues, which were $5.7 billion in the 2013-16 commercial cycle.<\/p>\n

The IOC argues this is crucial to help fund games organizers, national Olympic committees and sports\u2019 international governing bodies. A total of $540 million was shared among 28 summer sports federations from the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics, and the NOCs also shared the same amount.<\/p>\n

However, the IOC has resisted growing calls to pay athletes directly, including by the Athleten Deutschland group which gets funding from the federal government in Germany, Bach\u2019s home country.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou do not need others who pretend to speak on behalf of you,\u201d Bach had said on April, opening the IOC-hosted conference. The audience was drawn from approved athlete panels in around 185 national Olympic bodies plus sports governing bodies.<\/p>\n

Independent representatives, such as trade unions and the Global Athlete network launched this year and staffed by former World Anti-Doping Agency executives, were not invited.<\/p>\n

Growing activism among athletes saw two speed skaters defeat the International Skating Union\u2019s restrictive practices in a European ruling. Swimming body FINA increased prize money and created a new top-tier series after a privately owned competition was launched and three elite swimmers filed an anti-trust case in a Californian court.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou must have legitimacy,\u201d Bach said Sunday in a two-hour session answering questions from delegates. \u201cYou have to be accountable to somebody, and that means you have to be elected.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked about possible changes to Rule 40, Bach advised talking with a national Olympic body or sports federation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen you can negotiate and establish a fair balance between giving and taking,\u201d the IOC president said, cautioning that those national organizations could also rely on protecting their sponsors\u2019 exclusive rights. \u201cThe money is not falling from heaven.\u201d<\/p>\n

Five-time Olympian Natalie Cook, who represented Australia in beach volleyball, proposed the IOC could pay 1% of its four-yearly revenues into a $50 million retirement fund for athletes.<\/p>\n

Bach said the IOC had decided the best way to pay participants was directly funding national Olympic bodies which were \u201cin the best position to decide what they need to do for their athletes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is sometimes not easy to understand for an individual athlete,\u201d he acknowledged.<\/p>\n

via:: Summit Daily<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach from Germany speaks at the opening of the first day of the executive board meeting of the International Olympic Committee in Lausanne, Switzerland on March 26.Laurent Gillieron \/ AP | Keystone LAUSANNE, Switzerland \u2014 Amid International Olympic Committee resistance to athlete activism, Olympic competitors have been urged to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[99],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-795004","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-21 01:25:27","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSMT The Mountain","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/795004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=795004"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/795004\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=795004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=795004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=795004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}