Past President of UCI joins Play the Game 2017

As one of the latest entries in the programme, Brian Cookson, Past President of UCI, will join the conferences speakers on Monday afternoon and talk about the challenges in making reform on the inside of a sports federation. Author and journalist Declan Hill will also be joining this session with a talk entitled: Changing the Dirty Game: how to reform the sports integrity industrial complex.

Cookson will also be adding his voice in The Outer Line’s workshop on the role of sponsors in improving sports governance on Tuesday.

Another new speaker on the list is Professor Mike McNamee from Swansea University. McNamee is a co-author of a new WADA report that recommends not to use GPS tracking of athletes even if they are willing. McNamee speaks in Tuesday’s session about athletes’ privacy in doping control.

In a shuffle of sessions due to the cancellation of a presentation, the session about sport’s autonomy, previously scheduled for Tuesday, has been cancelled and speakers have been moved to other slots.

This has made room on Tuesday for a session organised by the Danish Institute for Sports Studies examining how countries can set up their own ‘Play the Game’ or sports observatories, mixing public communication and academic analysis.

Local partners in Eindhoven have arranged a well-filled social programme with outgoing activities displaying the city’s core competences in the field of sport and technology. Find more information about the social activities during the conference.

The line-up of speakers and panellists in the Opening session will surely initiate the following three days of debate with a lot of input on both anti-doping, mega-events and governance, but will not include RUSADA, as previously announced, due to an apology.

See the full programme

In more than 40 sessions, over 200 speakers will present their thoughts and opinions on a wide range of the most topical questions in world sport during the tenth Play the Game conference, taking place in Eindhoven, the Netherlands, 26-30 November 2017.

Discover the programme and the continuously updated speakers list.

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