President of the Organising Committee for the Olympic Games

The president of the Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games is the individual who is in charge of leading the Organizing Committee for each Olympic Games. During the opening and closing ceremonies, the president does a speech before the IOC president.

Lists of presidents

Summer Olympic Games

President	Game	Host city	Host country	Year
Prince Constantine of Greece	Games of the I Olympiad	Athens	Kingdom of Greece	1896
Pierre de Coubertin	Games of the II Olympiad	Paris	France	1900
David R. Francis	Games of the III Olympiad	St. Louis	United States	1904
William Grenfell, 1st Baron Desborough	Games of the IV Olympiad	London	United Kingdom	1908
Sigfrid Edström	Games of the V Olympiad	Stockholm	Sweden	1912
Henri de Baillet-Latour	Games of the VII Olympiad	Antwerp	Belgium	1920
Pierre de Coubertin	Games of the VIII Olympiad	Paris	France	1924
Solko van den Bergh	Games of the IX Olympiad	Amsterdam	Netherlands	1928
George Bryant	Games of the X Olympiad	Los Angeles	United States	1932
Joseph Goebbels Karl Ritter von Halt	Games of the XI Olympiad	Berlin	Nazi Germany	1936
Lord Burghley	Games of the XIV Olympiad	London	United Kingdom	1948
Erik von Frenckell	Games of the XV Olympiad	Helsinki	Finland	1952
Wilfrid Kent Hughes	Games of the XVI Olympiad	Melbourne	Australia	1956
Giulio Andreotti	Games of the XVII Olympiad	Rome	Italy	1960
Juichi Tsushima Daigoro Yasukawa [ja]	Games of the XVIII Olympiad	Tokyo	Japan	1964
Pedro Ramírez Vázquez	Games of the XIX Olympiad	Mexico City	Mexico	1968
Willi Daume [de]	Games of the XX Olympiad	Munich	West Germany	1972
Roger Rousseau	Games of the XXI Olympiad	Montreal	Canada	1976
Ignati Novikov [ru]	Games of the XXII Olympiad	Moscow	Soviet Union	1980
Peter Ueberroth	Games of the XXIII Olympiad	Los Angeles	United States	1984
Kim Yong-shik Roh Tae-woo Park Seh-jik	Games of the XXIV Olympiad	Seoul	South Korea	1988
Pasqual Maragall	Games of the XXV Olympiad	Barcelona	Spain	1992
Billy Payne	Games of the XXVI Olympiad	Atlanta	United States	1996
Gary Pemberton John Iliffe Michael Knight	Games of the XXVII Olympiad	Sydney	Australia	2000
Efstratios Stratigis Panayiotis Thomopoulos Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki	Games of the XXVIII Olympiad	Athens	Greece	2004
Liu Qi	Games of the XXIX Olympiad	Beijing	China	2008
Lord Sebastian Coe	Games of the XXX Olympiad	London	United Kingdom	2012
Carlos Arthur Nuzman	Games of the XXXI Olympiad	Rio de Janeiro	Brazil	2016
Yoshirō Mori Seiko Hashimoto	Games of the XXXII Olympiad	Tokyo	Japan	2021
Tony Estanguet	Games of the XXXIII Olympiad	Paris	France	2024
Casey Wasserman	Games of the XXXIV Olympiad	Los Angeles	United States	2028
Andrew Liveris	Games of the XXXV Olympiad	Brisbane	Australia	2032

Winter Olympic Games

President	Game	Host city	Host country	Year
Pierre de Coubertin	I Olympic Winter Games	Chamonix	France	1924
Edmund Schulthess	II Olympic Winter Games	St Moritz	Switzerland	1928
Godfrey Dewey	III Olympic Winter Games	Lake Placid	United States	1932
Joseph Goebbels Karl Ritter von Halt	IV Olympic Winter Games	Garmisch-Partenkirchen	Nazi Germany	1936
Alfred Schläppi Heinrich Schläppi	V Olympic Winter Games	St. Moritz	Switzerland	1948
Haakon VII of Norway Princess Astrid of Norway Olaf Helset	VI Olympic Winter Games	Oslo	Norway	1952
Paolo Ignazio Maria Thaon di Revel	VII Olympic Winter Games	Cortina d'Ampezzo	Italy	1956
Prentis Cobb Hale	VIII Olympic Winter Games	Squaw Valley	United States	1960
Bruno Kreisky	IX Olympic Winter Games	Innsbruck	Austria	1964
Albert Michallon	X Olympic Winter Games	Grenoble	France	1968
Kōgorō Uemura	XI Olympic Winter Games	Sapporo	Japan	1972
Bruno Kreisky	XII Olympic Winter Games	Innsbruck	Austria	1976
Ron MacKenzie Rev. J. Bernard Fell	XIII Olympic Winter Games	Lake Placid	United States	1980
Branko Mikulić	XIV Olympic Winter Games	Sarajevo	Yugoslavia	1984
Frank King[1]	XV Olympic Winter Games	Calgary	Canada	1988
Jean-Claude Killy Michel Barnier	XVI Olympic Winter Games	Albertville	France	1992
Gerhard Heiberg	XVII Olympic Winter Games	Lillehammer	Norway	1994
Eishiro Saito	XVIII Olympic Winter Games	Nagano	Japan	1998
Robert H. Garff Frank Joklik Mitt Romney	XIX Olympic Winter Games	Salt Lake City	United States	2002
Valentino Castellani	XX Olympic Winter Games	Turin	Italy	2006
John Furlong	XXI Olympic Winter Games	Vancouver	Canada	2010
Dmitry Chernyshenko	XXII Olympic Winter Games	Sochi	Russia	2014
Kim Jin-sun Cho Yang-ho Lee Hee-beom	XXIII Olympic Winter Games	Pyeongchang	South Korea	2018
Guo Jinlong Cai Qi	XXIV Olympic Winter Games	Beijing	China	2022
Giovanni Malagò	XXV Olympic Winter Games	Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo	Italy	2026
Edgar Grospiron	XXVI Olympic Winter Games	French Alps	France	2030

Summer Youth Olympic Games

President	Game	Host city	Host country	Year
Ng Ser Miang	I Summer Youth Olympic Games	Singapore	Singapore	2010
Li Xueyong	II Summer Youth Olympic Games	Nanjing	China	2014
Gerardo Werthein	III Summer Youth Olympic Games	Buenos Aires	Argentina	2018
Mamadou Ndiaye	IV Summer Youth Olympic Games	Dakar	Senegal	2026

Winter Youth Olympic Games

President	Game	Host city	Host country	Year
Richard Rubatscher	I Winter Youth Olympic Games	Innsbruck	Austria	2012
Siri Hatlen	II Winter Youth Olympic Games	Lillehammer	Norway	2016
Patrick Baumann Ira Logan Virginie Faivre	III Winter Youth Olympic Games	Lausanne	Switzerland	2020
Choi Moon-soon Choi Jong-gu	IV Winter Youth Olympic Games	Gangwon	South Korea	2024

Other offices held

Presidents of the Olympic Organizing Committee have gone on to or have served in other high offices.

Joseph Goebbels who headed the organizing committees for the 1936 Winter Olympics and 1936 Summer Olympics served as Chancellor of Germany for one day in 1945 before committing suicide.

Konstantin Chernenko was the leader of the Soviet Union while also being the President of the OCOG.

Elected office

David R. Francis who headed the organizing committee for the 1904 Summer Olympics served as Governor of Missouri prior to heading the organizing committee. He later briefly served as the United States Ambassador to Russia.

Following the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, Mitt Romney ran for Governor of Massachusetts and was elected Governor with nearly 50% of the vote in the election. He served one term as governor. He was the Republican nominee for President of the United States in the 2012 Presidential Election but lost to then-incumbent President Barack Obama. Sixteen years after the Winter Olympics, Romney would go on be to elected Senator for the state of Utah following the midterm election.

Yoshirō Mori who headed the organizing committee for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo until 2021, he served as Prime Minister of Japan from 2000 to 2001.

Michel Barnier who headed of the organizing committee for the 1992 Winter Olympics in Albertville is since the September 5, 2024, the 104th Prime Minister of France.

Other sporting positions

Pierre de Coubertin who headed the organizing committees for the 1900 and 1924 Summer Olympics as well as the 1924 Winter Olympics was the founder of the modern Olympic movement and International Olympic Committee. He served as President of the International Olympic Committee from 1896 to 1925.

Peter Ueberroth who headed the organizing committee for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles went on to serve as the Commissioner of Baseball from 1984 to 1989.

Sebastian Coe who headed the organizing committee for the 2012 Summer Olympics in London is now serving as the President of the International Association of Athletics Federations. He had also served as the Chairman of the British Olympic Association from 2012 to 2016.

Notes