New IOF President, VPs and Council Members elected by General Assembly

IOF XXXII Ordinary General Assembly took place on Monday at the WOC 2024 event centre in Pollock Halls in Edinburgh.

Delegations from 39 member federations were present – either on site or through the hybrid meeting solution online.

Here all the reports and proposals put foreward in the agenda (find it here) were reviewed and put to a vote.
The complete minutes from the General Assembly will be available at a later time.

Then it was time for the IOF Council elections.

Here, Tom Hollowell (USA) was the only candidate for the seat as President and he was unanimously elected.

Hollowell has been Vice President since 2022 and worked as Secretary General / CEO for IOF for seven years prior to that.

He takes over the role from Leho Haldna (EST), who has served as IOF President from 2016 – 2024.


Retiring President Leho Haldna (left) and newly elected President Tom Hollowell

New Vice Presidents
Laszlo Zentai (HUN) and Linda Take (SWE) were elected among three candidates for the two vacant positions as Vice Presidents.

Eight candidates then stood for elections for four available positions as Council members.

After a closed vote, Ingrid Okkenhaug (NOR), Ildze Straume (LAT) and Takashi Sugiyama (JPN) were elected, whilst Jürg Hellmüller (SUI) was re-elected.


From left: Jürg Hellmüller, Ingrid Okkenhaug, Laszlo Zentai, Blair Trewin, Tom Hollowell, Linda Take, Ildze Straume and Dusan Vystavel

The General Assembly also approved Eline Gemperle (SUI, FootO) and Jonatan Ståhl (SWE, SkiO) as Athletes Representatives in the IOF Council.

The IOF Council for the congress period 2024-2026:

Tom Hollowell (USA) – President
Laszlo Zentai (HUN) – Vice President
Linda Take (SWE) – Vice President
Tatiana Kalenderoglu (TUR) – Vice President
Dusan Vystavel (CZE) – Member
Blair Trewin (AUS) – Member
Hannu Kottonen (FIN) – Member
Jürg Hellmüller (SUI) – Member
Ingrid Okkenhaug (NOR) – Member
Ildze Straume (LAT) – Member
Takashi Sugiyama (JPN) – Member
Eline Gemperle – Member and Athlete Representative
Jonatan Ståhl – Member and Athlete Representative

Honorary awards
Before the meeting ended, a number of honorary awards and titles were presented.

Now former President Leho Haldna was made Honorary President and the retiring Senior Vice President Astrid Waaler Kaas was made Honorary Member. Both also received the IOF Gold Pin for their many years in service for the IOF.


Leho Haldna is awarded IOF’s Gold pin by Tom Hollowell


Astrid Waaler Kaas also received IOF’s Gold pin

The following Pins of Honour were awarded:

IOF Golden pins:
Leho Haldna
Astrid Waaler Kaas

IOF Silver pins:
Zoran Milovanovic
Laszlo Zentai
Tom Hollowell

IOF Bronze pins:
Eric Saintrond
Florian Howald
Janos Manarin
Jean-Philippe Stefanini
Libor Forst
Lok-Hin Ma
Per Forsberg
Stefano Bisoffi
Steven Hale
Walther Rahbek
Erik Blomgren
Tereza Janosikova

The video stream from the General Assembly is available here