Athletics: Cash for Medals at Paris Olympics!
By Prof Dr Ian Blackshaw
World Athletics, the Global Governing Body of Track and Field, have announced that they will award prize money at the Summer Olympic Games to be held in Paris later this year.
They have set aside a fund of US$2.4 million, and winners of gold medals will receive US$50,000 each and this sum will be shared between relay gold medallists.
The scheme will be extended to the winners of silver and bronze medallists at the Summer Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 2028.
However, the scheme will not apply, at present, to the Paralympics, which take place in Paris from 28 August to 8 September.
Some commentators have questioned whether such prize money is in the spirit of the Olympics.
In reply, the President of World Athletics, Lord Sebastian Coe, has stated:
“I don’t see that making life easier for the athletes, allowing them maybe to stay on in the sport a little bit longer, to give them the financial independence to train, and maybe in a more sophisticated way is anything other than sitting behind good firm Olympic principles.”
And Denise Lewis, a heptathlon gold medallist for Great Britain at the 2000 Sydney Summer Olympic Games, has added:
“This is nothing to do with ‘the Olympics is supposed to be about valour, about honour and representation of your country’, this is absolutely a gesture from World Athletics to its athletes.”
It should also be mentioned that some National Olympic Committees offer financial rewards to their medallists, as well as some countries.
Other sports are expected to follow the example set by World Athletics; swimming is thought to be one of them.
Prof Dr Ian Blackshaw may be contacted by e-mail at ‘
