Jacques Rogge: Biography

Jacques Rogge is a Belgian athlete and physician who was president of the International Olympic Committee from 2001 to 2013.

Charm

Rogge, of course, could use his official position to spend more time with such attractive sportsmen as Lerin Franco, but it was not in his spirit. First, he has Anne's wife, ever since he participated in the Olympics. He is already over 70, so his loyalty as husband and honorary president of the IOC has always been expressed in the care of games and his family, which also includes a pair of adult children.

Despite his age and marital status, Jacques Rogge still makes efforts to associate himself with much younger athletes. At the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, he became the first functionary who stopped not in a hotel but in a room in the Olympic Village on a par with other athletes.

Rogge collected an impressive collection of works of art. According to him, here it is more abstract than romantic.

History of success

Jacques Rogge was the most important person in the sport. As president of the IOC, he was responsible for the Olympic Games, and he held this position from 2001 to 2013. The former surgeon had the necessary sports experience to match his position - Rogge participated in four Olympics and three World Championships as a yachtsman and in 10 international championships as a player of the Belgian national rugby team.

The greatest contribution of the IOC President was the introduction of important changes in the Olympic system aimed at combating cheating on the part of athletes and their use of doping. Although no system is perfect, he showed that he is not engaged in patronage and is ready to punish everyone who violates the rules, including some of his allies. Critics can say that Jacques Rogge was too rigid in his fight against doping, but he also believed that athletes could improve and deserved a second chance. In addition, at the beginning of his term as head of the IOC, he faced a corruption and doping scandal at the Olympics in Salt Lake City, which could cause irreparable damage to his case, but with honor he coped with this difficult situation.

Jacques Rogge: Biography

The future president of the IOC was born in Ghent, Belgium, on 02.05.42. He moved to England at a young age and eventually became fluent in five languages: English, French, Spanish, German and Dutch. Also Rogge spent a lot of time on the rugby field. Upon his return to his homeland, he continued to play and subsequently 10 times played for his country's national team.

However, this is not all that Jacques Rogge achieved. The sport in which he achieved the greatest success is yachting. He became the world champion and twice finished in the top three. Jacques Rogge performed at three Olympic Games in a row in yachting competitions - in 1968-1976.

An indelible mark on the fate of the Belgian yachtsman left the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich. It was there that a group of Palestinians killed several Israeli athletes, and this act of terrorism was a sad event in his life.

Violation of boycott of the Olympics-80

The year 1980 marked another memorable event in the life of the Olympic functionary, this time not as tragic as in Munich. Having a sporting past, Jacques Rogge was engaged in the preparation of the national team of Belgium. Due to hostile relations between Russia and NATO, the government did not want to send a team to the Olympics in the country that occupied Afghanistan the year before, but Jacques Rogge went against his own political leadership so that his compatriots could participate in this event . It is obvious that the Belgian athlete possessed the skills of a born leader.

As a result of the events of 1980, the focus of Rogge's career shifted to medicine, although he did not overlook the sphere of sports administration. Jacques received a degree in sports medicine from the University of Ghent and found the work of an orthopedic surgeon. For three years he collaborated with the Belgian Olympic Committee and in 1989 was elected chairman of the European EC, which remained until 2001.

In 1991, Rogge became a member of the IOC, and in 1998 he became a representative of the executive board. He played a key role in the coordination of the Summer Olympics in Sydney in 2000 and helped prepare in 2004 in Athens.

Jacques Rogge is president of the IOC

In 2001, Juan Antonio Samaranch, president of the International Olympic Committee, decided not to seek re-election to his post at the end of his term. In July of the same year, Jacques Rogge was elected instead of him, thanks to his successful Olympic experience as an athlete and official representative of this organization. He left his medical practice and moved to IOC headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland.

After the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 in the US, Rogge was given the authority to stop the Olympic Games without the vote of the entire committee. The President promised not to resort to these extreme measures and never did.

Soon after, during his first Olympics in Salt Lake City, USA, in 2002, he faced a scandal that arose from bribes that some of his fellow officials took. The eighth president in the 107-year history of the IOC has promised to clean up the ranks of the committee staff in particular and sports in general, having started a decisive fight against corruption and the use of doping.

Although Jacques Rogge displeased over his support for Beijing at the 2008 Olympics, he played an important role in making a number of changes in the way of international competitions. The IOC president reduced the number of Olympians to just over 10,000 and launched a new doping control program that tests athletes all year round, including in other countries. He even went so far as to punish the French and Russian participants, although these countries were his main allies. This had a huge impact on the Olympic Games - many athletes, such as Marion Jones, were charged with doping.

In an effort to promote the Olympics among the young generation, Rogge contributed to the inclusion of youth sports such as snowboarding, which debuted in 2006 in Turin, or a bicycle motocross that started in 2008 in Beijing. In 2007, he added to the calendar the Youth Olympic Games, which began to be held in 2010.

Leaving the IOC and rewards

Rogge's term of office came to an end at the 125th IOC meeting in Buenos Aires. 10/10/2013 he was replaced by the representative of Germany Thomas Bach, and he became the Honorary President.

Jacques Rogge is the Knight of the orders of France, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Great Britain, Luxembourg, Romania, Ukraine, Austria, South Africa, Lithuania and Russia, and also the honorary titles of the universities of Ghent, Leuven, Budapest and Lausanne.