Hybl Wins USOC Presidency Without the Electoral College

No longer needing to consolidate their efforts against now-defunct Eastern Bloc sports machines, U.S. Olympic Committee members turned on themselves this fall. They were so equally divided that the result of the first contested election for president in the USOC’s 102-year history Saturday could have been altered by one voter.

“It was like a shot at the buzzer,” said Dick Schultz, the USOC’s executive director, after the vote by the board of directors.

Whether the shot was a hit or miss depends on one’s perspective. Bill Hybl, 54, of Colorado Springs, Colo., won over another lawyer, Michael Lenard, 41, of Los Angeles, by a vote of 91.04 to 88.68. Because the votes of the 99 directors were weighted differently according to their positions on the board, that represented a difference in no more than three of the secret ballots and perhaps as few as one.

The long-range impact of the election remains to be seen. Both are familiar with the inner workings of the USOC, Lenard as a vice president for the last eight years and Hybl as interim president in 1991-92, and their goals are largely the same.

Their constituencies, however, are different. Lenard, a team handball player in the 1984 Olympics, has been a leader in empowering athletes within the movement. Hybl, who heads a foundation in Colorado Springs that has funded projects by the USOC and its sports governing bodies, has been more closely associated with the movement’s officials.

Lenard was supported by the athletes, who hold 20% of the votes, and Hybl by the major governing bodies for sports such as track and field, swimming, gymnastics and figure skating.

“At the end of the day, it probably doesn’t make much difference who won,” said Tom Welch, a nonvoting but interested observer as president of the organizing committee for the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.

“Either way, we’re going to have Olympic teams that are well-funded and represent the country to the best of their abilities. As long as that’s the case, there’s no great public interest here.”

But interest within the USOC was intense, so much so that the election originally scheduled for today was moved to Saturday afternoon to relieve tension and halt the internal politicking that had been pervasive since members began arriving here Friday.

Outgoing president LeRoy Walker used part of his farewell address before announcing the result of the vote to implore members to “show greater concern for each other, greater concern for the organization, to develop a greater sense of trust and take the high road toward a greater sense of fellowship.”

The strife intensified when a nominating committee selected earlier this year was considered by some as weighted toward Hybl. An ethics committee found that two members, Don Porter of the Amateur Softball Assn. and Warren Brown of USA Basketball, had been involved on behalf of their sports in financial dealings with Hybl’s El Pomar Foundation.

Although the ethics committee found no wrongdoing on either part, it recommended that they resign. They refused and Walker allowed them to remain on the nominating committee, which slated Hybl as the official candidate for president, 15-0.

Never before has the official slate been challenged, but that changed when 15 member organizations moved to have Lenard’s name put on the ballot. Some members described the ensuing campaign as a “civil war,” although Hybl and Lenard remained for the most part above it.

“I hope it didn’t get personal,” Hybl said. “Things generally aren’t said by the candidates. They’re said by those working for them.”