THE STORY SO FAR

NEXT YEAR THE ENGLISH CAPITAL IS POISED ONCE AGAIN TO STAGE A SUMMER OF ATHLETICS LIKE NEVER BEFORE

REPORT: JASON HENDERSON

IT IS ALMOST six years to the day since London won the right to stage the IAAF World Championships in 2017. Back then, on November 11, 2011, a British bid team led by Sebastian Coe defeated Doha during a vote in Monaco. At the time, the London Olympics and Paralympics were imminent, but the nation also captured the honour of hosting the sport’s global track and field championships in the summer of 2017.

Doha was the strong favourite, but the Qatari capital was let down by its infamously scorching temperatures, while the Middle East country’s petro-dollars were no match for British athletics’ tried-and-trusted organisational abilities and its promise of passionate, knowledgeable fans.

In 2011 a London bid team that included (below, l to r) Boris Johnson, Niels de Vos, Denise Lewis, Seb Coe, Jodie Williams, Ed Warner and Hugh Robertson beat Doha to win the right to stage the 2017 World Championships

PICTURES: MARK SHEARMAN

Coe was joined by Ed Warner and Niels de Vos of UK Athletics, Olympic champion Denise Lewis and sprints talent Jodie Williams as the bidding battle reached its climax in Monaco. Sports minister Hugh Robertson and London Mayor Boris Johnson added political weight to the proceedings by supporting the bid team in the principality. This included Robertson telling IAAF officials that Britain had invested £9.3 billion in sport via London 2012 – a figure which dwarfed even the Qatari bid’s millions – and everyone’s effort ultimately paid off as London beat Doha by 16 votes to 10.

“For London and for Great Britain, there is no better way to follow the Olympics, and to build on its legacy, than by welcoming the world’s greatest athletes back to London for the 2017 World Championships,” said the then Prime Minister David Cameron, who sent handwritten letters to IAAF Council members.

London’s victory was also a triumph of teamwork as the bid incorporated a joint effort between UK Athletics, the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, the Mayor of London and UK Sport. Political oomph aside, heptathlete Lewis described the London 2017 bid as “a heartfelt bid and the athletes’ choice.”

Even Athletics Weekly played its part. On the eve of the bid we published a London 2017 special with a cover photo (below), of Phillips Idowu carrying a “vote London” banner. Around 80 of these magazines were then sent to Monaco and distributed among IAAF Council members.

“With its brand-new Olympic Stadium, age-old love of athletics, super-cool climate and even cooler organising ability, London is surely the common sense choice for 2017,” we wrote in our magazine leader column.

Looking back now, Ed Warner describes winning the bid as his proudest moment as UKA chairman. Although it was the end of a long bidding process that actually began with what he calls “a false start”. He explains: “Our first dream in 2009 was that we’d bid for the World Championships in 2015 and that came from a conversation I had with Seb in his LOCOG office at Canary Wharf, where we decided it would be a great thing to do on the back of the Olympics in order to use the stadium but we couldn’t persuade Government to back a 2015 bid because they wouldn’t at that stage commit to a track remaining in the stadium.