The preparation of the French sports movement for the Paris 2024 Olympic meeting is not a long, quiet river. Some federations are facing revolt from some of their athletes, sometimes in reaction to decisions that they themselves have made, in other cases due to old dissensions rekindled as the Games approach. A few days apart, fencing, athletics and skateboarding find themselves in the spotlight and illustrate, in their own way, “a running out of steam in the French federal model”in the words of former Olympic sabre champion and sports minister Jean-François Lamour.
« There is great fatigue in the federal world, a lot of dismay, a lack of resources, a real doubt about the model and few answers to all of that, analyzes this fine connoisseur of French sport. Very few federations today can say that everything is going well. » Fencing, his favorite sport, is an example.
In fencing, bitterness and defections
Saturday June 22, in Basel (Switzerland), Alexandre Bardenet and the French swordsmen climb to the top step of the team event of the European fencing championships. The shooter was called up at the last minute to compensate for the injury of his teammate Yannick Borel. Restricted to the role of substitute, he did not play a single touch but celebrated this title as if nothing had happened. However, his bitterness is great. During his stay in Basel, he did not exchange a single word with the national men’s epee coach, Gauthier Grumier.
Tuesday June 25, at the headquarters of the French National Olympic and Sports Committee (CNOSF), in Paris. Alexandre Bardenet arrives alongside his lawyer, Thierry Braillard, former Secretary of State for Sports (from 2014 to 2017). Fifteenth in the world rankings, the swordsman contacted the CNOSF conciliators’ conference following his non-selection for the Olympics, believing he had been excluded for extra-sporting reasons. Paul Allègre, who was preferred, appears at 62e rank in the international hierarchy.
The opinion of the conciliation conference will be communicated to both parties – who can decide whether or not to follow it – by the end of the week. Based on a procedural defect in the composition of the selection committee that dismissed him, Alexandre Bardenet is requesting that the selection be cancelled. If the conciliation commission were to agree, the FFE could reconvene its selection committee by 5 July, the date on which the CNOSF publishes the latest list of French players selected for the Olympic Games.
But the uneasiness runs deeper. Since March 2023, the FFE has been going through a zone of turbulence and has seen its national technical director (DTN), its president and three of its six national coaches resign, including one two months before the Paris Games. The French men’s saber and epee teams have imploded. Seven of their best elements (including Alexandre Bardenet, but also the reigning Olympic epee champion, Romain Cannone) left the National Institute of Sport, Expertise and Performance (Insep), where they have been training since for decades the French elite.
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The fencers nevertheless obtained satisfactory results throughout the season, leaving the European Championships with eight medals. They will arrive ambitiously at the Grand Palais, where the Olympic events will take place.
In athletics, blunders and disciplinary procedures
The situation of French athletics is also paradoxical. Despite the good results of the European Championships in Rome in June – sixteen medals – the federation (FFA) incurred an unexpected controversy. On June 14, three of its athletes, absent from the Roman meeting, received a summons letter for July 4 before the disciplinary committee. Signed by the president of the federation, André Giraud, the letter criticizes Hugo Hay, Mouhamadou Fall and Rougui Sow for having criticized “the FFA, its leaders and collaborators on the social network X”.
The first named, who achieved the Olympic minimums over 5,000 meters, is criticized in particular for two tweets: “Shame” and “Thank you to the athletes and foreign leaders for the lobbying”. The half-distance runner referred to administrative errors, recognized by the federation, which had forgotten to register two French athletes for the Rome meeting and, conversely, failed to remove thirteen other than them from the selection. did not wish to send to Italy.
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Joined by The worldthe DTN, Patrick Ranvier “assumes having suggested to the president to refer the matter to the disciplinary body”. Faced with those who are surprised by the timing, the technical framework is explained: “The majority of athletes and management can sometimes suffer from untimely statements on social networks. It’s my duty to protect them. »
In full Olympic preparation, Hugo Hay asked to be interviewed by videoconference: “If it is not accepted, I will not travel for this charade. » He also questions the number of athletes summoned when there has been more criticism: “Why me and not the others? » To which Mr. Ranvier responds: “We are able to gauge the messages. Sasha (Zhoya, 110m hurdles) did it too, it’s still lighter and less usual. »
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The 27-year-old athlete confirms Monde that he will ask for the charges to be dropped, “not even a warning or a call to order”because a sanction would mean, for him, “that high-level athletes are deprived of any critical view on the actions of the federation”. And to assert: “Especially when the criticism is so mild and the comments are in support of the aggrieved athletes. »
Hugo Hay does not fear a suspension for the Olympics and assures that the legal director of the FFA called him to tell him that he did not think he would be sanctioned. “Repeated administrative errors and the ongoing disciplinary procedure do more damage to the image of the federation than a few tweets”judges the middle distance runner.
On skateboards, anxiety and the need for autonomy
A blurred image a few weeks before the Games, that is what prevails for the French Roller and Skate Federation (FFRS), faced with a protest movement from the skateboarding community. Of the twelve sports that the federation brings together, skateboarding is the youngest of the family. It only counts around 7,000 of the FFRS’s 68,000 licensees, but it is also the only one to have Olympic status, since the Tokyo Games in 2021.
The French team seems well underway in its preparation for those in Paris, since seven athletes will compete in the “street” and “park” events at Place de la Concorde, twice as many as for the 2020 Olympics.
However, here again, the tension is palpable between athletes and the federal authorities. Main headliners of French skateboarding, Aurélien Giraud (2023 world champion), Vincent Milou (fourth at the Tokyo Games) and Vincent Matheron (2023 French champion) are among the seventeen co-signatories of a letter sent on the 6th June to the president of the FFRS, Boris Darlet.
The document, which The world was able to consult, denounce “an unacceptable situation”. “Our discipline has no political and financial autonomy, it therefore has no guarantee of its future” worry the authors of the letter, who demand a dedicated budget and national technical direction, statutory development, and a development plan over four to eight years.
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“People at the federation do not know our sport and our culturee, estimates co-signatory Jéromine Louvet, member of the French team and representative of the athletes. We want to be listened to, considered and respected.” “We will meet in July and propose an action plan after the Paris Olympics,” Mr. Darlet replies. For the latter, the 645,000 euros committed for the Olympic preparation of skateboarding, the equivalent of the budget of all the other disciplines of the federation, are a good indicator of the interest of his federation in this sport.
Dialogue, yes, but on condition of“obtain a roadmap before the Games, by July 12”, insists Claire Barbier-Essertel, president of the national skateboard technical commission. If no one wishes to comment on the continuation of the movement in the event of failure of the discussions, everyone agrees: the crisis is deep and old.
