Top IAAF posts for Coe and Bubka

OSAKA, Japan -- Former Olympic champions and world record holders Sebastien Coe and Sergei Bubka have both been elected as vice-presidents of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF).

The 50-year-old Coe, who won back-to-back 1500 meters golds at the 1980 Moscow and 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, and pole vault king Bubka, who won in Seoul in 1988, will serve four-year terms.

Also elected to the position of vice-presidents, ahead of the World Championships in Osaka, were American lawyer Robert Hersh and Dahlan Al-Hamad, the head of Qatar's Association of Athletic Federations.

Senegal's Lamine Diack was voted into a final four-year term as the IAAF president.

Both Coe and Bubka said they were focused on what they would do in the next four years and not on succeeding Diack in the future.

"I'm very happy and it is a great honor that so many federations have voted for me," Coe said. "It has created a very good group of vice presidents who can work very well together."

The 43-year-old Bubka, who broke the pole vault world record 35 times and is still the record-holder, said it would be a "big challenge" for him to serve as one of the IAAF vice presidents and that he and Coe had been chosen because of their achievements, not just medals from the past. E-mail to a friend