(ATR) The U.S. Olympic Committee is poised to name Scott Blackmun as its next CEO, sources tell Around the Rings.
Blackmun, 52, is an attorney in Colorado Springs and formerly served as USOC counsel as well as acting CEO.
A formal announcement from the USOC is scheduled for Wednesday morning at USOC headquarters in Colorado Springs.
"There will be no learning curve required for him. He knows how the Olympic business works," USA Luge President Dwight Bell tells Around the Rings.
Bell was the chef de mission for the U.S. team to the Salt Lake City Winter Games and worked with Blackmun in the leadup to 2002.
"He's not flamboyant. He projects a very good demeanor. He's not afraid to put the Olympic Movement and his consituencies in front," says Bell.
Blackmun will take over from Stephanie Streeter, a former member of the USOC Board of Directors who became interim CEO in March when Jim Scherr left the post under pressure from the USOC board. Streeter elected not to seek the CEO position on a permanent basis.
Blackmun was reported to be one of two finalists for the job. Chuck Wielgus, executive director of USA Swimming was said to be the other candidate.
Blackmun will return to a USOC suffering from a reputation of leadership instability and seemingly waning presence on the international scene.
After leaving the USOC in 2001, Blackmun became Chief Operating Officer for the Anschutz Entertainment Group in Los Angeles. In 2006 he returned to Colorado to the law firm of Holme Roberts and Owen, the firm where he began practicing law in 1982. He is a graduate of Stanford Law School and Dartmouth College.
To subscribe to Around the Rings Click Here
Written by Ed Hula.
Recent Articles
Sinner-Alcaraz, the duel that came to succeed the three phenomenons
Beyond the final result, Roland Garros left the feeling that the Italian and the Spaniard will shape the great duel that came to help us through the duel for the end of the Federer-Nadal-Djokovic era.
Table tennis: Brazil’s Bruna Costa Alexandre will be Olympic and Paralympic in Paris 2024
She is the third in her sport and the seventh athlete to achieve it in the same edition; in Santiago 2023 she was the first athlete with disabilities to compete at the Pan American level and won a medal.
Rugby 7s: the best player of 2023 would only play the medal match in Paris
Argentinian Rodrigo Isgró received a five-game suspension for an indiscipline in the circuit’s decisive clash that would exclude him until the final or the bronze match; the Federation will seek to make the appeal successful.
Rhonex Kipruto, owner of the world record for the 10000 meters on the road, was suspended for six years
The Kenyan received the maximum sanction for irregularities in his biological passport and the Court considered that he was part of a system of “deliberate and sophisticated doping” to improve his performance. He will lose his record and the bronze medal at the Doha World Cup.
Katie Ledecky spoke about doping Chinese swimmers: “It’s difficult to go to Paris knowing that we’re going to compete with some of these athletes”
The American, a seven-time Olympic champion, referred to the case of the 23 positive controls before the Tokyo Games that were announced a few weeks ago and shook the swimming world. “I think our faith in some of the systems is at an all-time low,” he said.
