European Athletics is pleased to invite you – as a media representative – to contribute to the future of our sport by taking part in a survey on the competition structure and calendar in Europe.
In the manifesto for his presidential candidature, “Leading Change”, the European Athletics President Svein Arne Hansen outlined that he wanted to work closely with the IAAF and other stakeholders to restructure the athletics calendar, while preserving the interests of European Member Federations and to deliver measures to help the organisers to increase the attractiveness of their competitions.
The previous Council of European Athletics had already agreed in November 2014 to create a link between the One-day Meetings and the European Athletics Championships in order to define the participation criteria at the different levels of one-day meetings and to create a qualification system for these major Championships.
The current Executive Board took the opportunity to use the Member Federations Leaders Forum in 2015 to receive input from the federations on this concept to further develop it.
At the same time, a similar process is taking place within IAAF that is also reviewing the international competition system, the calendar and the One-day Meetings.
To make sure that any future changes best suit the interests of Athletics in Europe, all stakeholder groups, such as member federations, organisers, athletes, coaches, athletes representatives, media and television are being consulted and their views will be considered in the decisions taken by European Athletics and represented within the process the IAAF takes.
The aim of this survey and the surveys to the other stakeholders is then to provide the European Athletics Executive Board and Council with the information they need to make decisions on changes within their power or to set the European Athletics strategy for working within the IAAF process.
The topics to be explored are mainly the international championships structure (all age groups), calendar, one-day meeting system and the qualification for the European Athletics Championships.
The final goal of this project is to develop an attractive and sustainable competition system and a well-balanced calendar on a global as well as European level that better meets the needs of the European stakeholders than the current structure.
The deadline to complete the short survey is 29 February 2016.
Link to the survey:
https://europeanathletics.formstack.com/forms/comp_structure