Bubka to take on Coe

Paris - Ukrainian pole vault legend Sergei Bubka will challenge Britain's Sebastian Coe for the presidency of the International Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF), he confirmed on Wednesday.

The two men are the only candidates so for to succeed Lamine Diack, who is due to step down in August.

Bubka, 51, said: "I want to give back to the world of athletics what it brought me throughout the different phases of my life."

An IAAF council member since 2001 and vice-president since 2007, Bubka set 35 world pole vault records in a glittering career which brought him an Olympic gold in the colours of the Soviet Union in 1988 and six consecutive world championships from 1983 to 1997, three of them for Ukraine.

Former middle distance star Coe, who headed the London 2012 Olympic organising committee, threw his hat into the ring in November with a pledge to attract more young people to the sport and crack down on the scourge of doping.

Diack, 81, has been president since succeeding Primo Nebiolo in 1999 but will retire this year and the vote for his successor will take place at the IAAF Congress in Beijing.