Historic year for female Olympic leaders sees table tennis president face election challenge

Ahead of the IOC’s first female president Kirsty Coventry formally taking over next month, one of the few women leading an Olympic sport faces an election challenge. Petra Sörling has been the International Table Tennis Federation’s president since 2021. Badminton and golf also have female presidents. Sörling is in a May 27 contest against men from Qatar and Mauritania. The vote is in Doha after the world championships. Qatari candidate Khalil al-Mohannadi is a veteran of ITTF politics since 1997. Sörling says "it’s a democratic world and everyone is, let’s say, free to make their campaign.”