Lord Coe will demand Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg ‘sort out’ the ‘pond life’ abusing female sports stars on social media if he becomes International Olympic Committee president.
The World Athletics boss has also vowed to find better ways to protect women athletes from the ‘waterfall of horror’ that awaits them when they find fame, in the wake of Emma Raducanu’s recent stalking ordeal.
Coe was speaking less than two weeks before the IOC presidential election, when he hopes to succeed Thomas Bach in the most powerful job in sport.
British athletes Eilish McColgan and Georgia Hunter Bell have spoken out this week about the ‘dark side’ of social media, which has seen them body shamed by trolls online – and Coe wants urgent talks with tech giants to tackle the problem.
Asked what his message would be to X owner Musk and Facebook and Instagram chief Zuckerberg, he said: ‘Sort this out. This is just unacceptable. We’ve got to do a whole heap more.
‘I’ve seen the distress this has caused. It’s pond life and I’ve spoken to many of the female athletes about it. Some of the stuff, you just want to cry listening to it.
Lord Coe is eager for a crackdown on those abusing female sports stars on social media if he becomes IOC president
If he becomes IOC president Coe wants to hold talks with X owner Elon Musk (L) and Facebook and Instagram chief Mark Zuckerberg (R)
‘I remember an athlete saying to me, “I just don’t care anymore”. And I said, “You should care, you should be really angry about this stuff”.
‘What you don’t want is people just thinking you get to the highest level in female sport and it’s sort of what happens. We should not accept it as being sort of standard practice.
‘It’s not new, but there’s just more of it. There’s a huge element of social media that’s actually an act of cowardice. It’s saying stuff that you can probably say because it’s anonymous and you wouldn’t say it to somebody’s face.’
Asked if he would talk with Musk and Zuckerberg directly, Coe said: ‘Absolutely. We have to talk. You’ve got the technology there. AI can be really helpful in driving some of this stuff out.’
In his job as World Athletics president, Coe has also recently been working to tackle the issue of gender-based violence after Ugandan marathon runner Rebecca Cheptegei was murdered by her ex-boyfriend last year.
The revelation that tennis star Raducanu was followed by a fixated fan in Dubai has brought the safety of sportswomen further into question – and Coe said: ‘It’s vital that women feel that sport is a safe space.
‘You cannot have young athletes thinking the second you get public exposure that this comes at you like a waterfall of horror.’
Meanwhile, Coe says he is ready to move the Olympics outside its traditional summer slot, insisting that climate change means the usual window of July and August is no longer suitable.
British athlete Eilish McColgan spoke out this week about the ‘dark side’ of social media
Emma Raducanu’s recent stalking ordeal highlighted the problems female athlete can face
Coe would welcome a Saudi Arabia bid for the Olympic Games which, if successful, would mean the event being held in the winter.
He would also welcome a Saudi Arabia bid for the Games which, if successful, would mean the event being held in the winter.
‘We’re going to have to have a readjustment of the global calendar,’ said Coe. ‘That is the one thing we’re going to have to address and we should have done it earlier.
‘With climate change, can we much longer ask athletes, even in Budapest or Paris, to be running in August? No, it doesn’t work.’
Coe has already pushed back the next two editions of the World Athletics Championships – in Tokyo this year and Beijing in 2027 – to September.
The Olympics was last held in September in 2000 in Sydney. But Coe would be happy for the Games to be even later if Saudi won the bid for 2040 – like the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar was moved to November and December.
‘We had a World Cup in Qatar, which was arguably the most successful,’ he said. ‘We had the World Championships in Qatar that went well into October and, in terms of athlete performance, they were the best ever.’
The next Olympics are in Los Angeles in July 2028, which will require Coe to work closely with Donald Trump. Asked if he would be happy to deal with the divisive US President, he said: ‘Yes. I can’t believe that he won’t want these Games to be a huge success.
‘The Games is bigger than any individual. It’s not a landscape that’s alien to me. I’ve had some really feisty conversations in host cities with political leaders.’
