IOC Congress #5

Venue Lausanne (SUI)
Held 7 – 11 May 1913

Description

The 5th Olympic Congress took place at the Palais de Rumine at the Université de Lausanne in Lausanne, Switzerland, from 8-10 May 1913. The IOC was not yet headquartered in Lausanne. The first time that the Olympic Movement as a group journeyed to the city occurred shortly before the Congress when the 1913 IOC Session was also held in Lausanne.

The theme of the Congress was the “Psychology and Physiology of Sports.” The Congress was chaired by Professor Maurice Millioud, a professor of philosophy in Lausanne, with the organizing committee presided over by Dr. Jean Morax until his death in January 1913, and then by Dr. Max Auckenthaler. Approximately 100 people attended the Congess, most of them Swiss. There were only three IOC Members present throughout the Congess – Pierre de Coubertin, Count Eugenio Brunetta d’Usseaux (ITA) and Baron Godefroy de Blonay (SUI).

The opening lecture at the Congress was given by Italian historian Guglielmo Ferrero, entitled “The limits of sport.” Ferrero specifically warned that sport could not be a panacea for all the problems of society.

There were three commissions at this Congress: 1) Origins of sporting activities; 2) Methods and forms of physical activity; and 3) Results of physical activity as a philosophy of life. The first commission began with the reading of a paper by former US President Theodore Roosevelt, who sent Coubertin his regrets that he could not attend the Congress. His paper noted, “To develop one’s physical strength is a propitious means to obtain moral strength, the first being worth nothing without the latter.”

There was an Opening Ceremony with about 400 participants, but on average only 75 attendees were at the lectures, although the Congress was open to anyone. There were 37 individual research reports given during the five half-day sessions.

Resolutions were not passed at the end of this Congress, as has been standard at most Olympic Congresses. The lectures were presided over by Prof. Millioud, and he stated that many of the lectures lacked scientific investigations into the psychological and physiological effects of physical activity.

Millioud summarized the Congress in the 18 May 1913 issue of Gazette de Lausanne, “The achievement of the Congress of Lausanne was to define this intellect. Do we regret not having found a universally valid definition? … Not all questions could be answered, this was to be expected, but a lot of questions have been asked and they cannot be forgotten. An idealisation of sport as well as its propagation are indispensable and are more and more the subject of growing public attention.”