London will not be considered as a host for large sporting events such as the World Athletics Championships because of its poor air quality, Sebastian Coe has warned.
The World Athletics president and two-time Olympic gold medallist, who led the capital’s successful bid for the 2012 Games, added that rising temperatures would force sports bodies to change their calendar of events.
Speaking to Gary Lineker in a panel discussion about the environment at Wimbledon on Thursday, Lord Coe said: “We have made a decision that in future we probably won’t take our championships into landscapes where air quality falls below a certain threshold. And, actually, if I’m being a little closer to home, that would include London.”
Lineker asked if there was a danger that some countries would have to be ruled out of hosting sporting events because of the climate crisis. Coe replied: “This is the challenge, because I am a great believer that sport is global and we can’t just sit there on Tripadvisor going: ‘Wasn’t that great, we quite like going back to the same old places.’”
Coe highlighted the 44C temperatures at the US Olympic trials in Oregon in 2021. He also referred to next year’s Olympics in Paris, saying the French capital had experienced soaring temperatures in recent years.
“Thirty years ago, you would be sitting there saying, ‘well, you’re going to be OK if you take it to Europe or somewhere like that, you’re going to have sensible temperatures,’” he said.
The former middle-distance star said that sporting bodies would have to consider moving road endurance events from the world championships and Olympic Games to another time of the year.
“We are going to have to review the calendar for sport,” he said. “And I can see a World Athletics Championships in the foreseeable future where we are going to say our road race walking or our marathons should probably be moved to another part of the year. Maybe in with one of the big marathon majors, a London, Chicago or New York, at slightly more equitable times of the year.”
Lineker, who chaired the event, said that football was not doing enough to adopt greener practices. “It’s very difficult for sport, especially major competitions, as there’s so much travel involved, so many flights, a lot of footballers and football teams take private jets everywhere. Personally, this is just my opinion, and it will not happen, but I think private jets should be banned,” the Match of the Day presenter said.
The discussion came a day after Just Stop Oil protesters disrupted two matches at Wimbledon in another attempt to draw attention to the climate crisis.
Lineker asked the panellists about their reaction to the protest, saying: “It’s difficult, you can see why they do it because it raises PR and history tells you that this kind of demonstration is the only way that it really works. But it’s very disruptive.”
Heather Watson, the former Wimbledon mixed doubles champion, replied: “It was uncomfortable to watch. And then I was thinking if I was playing on that court, I wonder how I would have felt, and you don’t know what somebody’s running on the court for, you fear for your safety.”
