The PGA European Tour has appointed David Williams their Chairman of the Board of Directors from the start of the new year.

This follows the announcement in May 2013 that Neil Coles MBE would be stepping down from the role which he has held for the past 38 years.  David will be responsible for building on the legacy left by Neil Coles MBE, ailment further developing the Tour and its business activities around the world.

David brings considerable commercial experience to The PGA European Tour having led a wide range of public and private businesses over the last 35 years both as CEO and as Chair. These include senior roles at Whitbread Group PLC, stomach Diageo PLC and PepsiCo Restaurants Inc, Mothercare PLC and the Royal London Mutual Insurance Group Ltd.   David has worked across the world and his global experience will be invaluable as The PGA European Tour reaches out into new markets.

He is currently Chair of the Operating Partners at Duke Street Capital and acts on the Boards of a number of well known businesses in this capacity.    David has an MSc in Management from the London Business School where he was a Governor.

Commenting on his appointment, Williams said, “To follow in the footsteps of someone who has been as much of a figurehead as Neil Coles is a tremendous honour. The European Tour brand is strong and I will work with George O’Grady, his Executive team, the Players and the Board to take the organisation forward. In particular I’ll be looking to ensure that the Tour is structured in a way which enables it to further increase its expansion and appeal across the globe as well as working with the players and our business partners to promote long-term sustainable growth.”

The Chief Executive of the European Tour, George O’Grady CBE, welcomed the appointment: “The unique strength of the European Tour is the fact that the Members, through their representatives on the board, govern the Tour. They have chosen David Williams as Chairman as his management expertise, commercial experience, and business credentials will give everyone, those within the Tour and those connected to us, great confidence.   I am delighted to personally welcome David to the European Tour, and look forward to working with him, as we face our challenges both on the European and the global stage.”

Thomas Björn, Chairman of The European Tour Players’ Committee said, “On behalf of all of the players on The European Tour, I am delighted to welcome David as our new Chairman. David’s business credentials speak for themselves and I look forward to working with him as we continue to build on the success of The European Tour around the world.

“I know every one of the players will be delighted to welcome David personally at the first event he attends.”

The BBC has delivered its most successful online event ever, anesthetist attracting a record-breaking 55m global browsers to BBC Sport online (cumulative reach) throughout the course of the Games, unhealthy and marking London 2012 as the first truly digital Games.

This has mirrored the BBC’s record Olympic TV reach, across both linear TV channels and Red Button, with over 51.9m viewers in the UK – the largest TV audience reach for a major event for at least 10 years.

BBC Sport online delivered comprehensive, quality coverage including a page for every athlete, country, sport and venue; 2,500 hours of coverage; and up to 24 HD live streams, ensuring audiences never missed a moment of the action. And, by making every sport available across PC, mobile, tablet and connected TV, viewers could keep up to date with the action, whenever and wherever they were.

Putting live and catch-up video at the heart of the BBC’s online coverage, BBC Sport launched its new live interactive video player. This enabled viewers to watch and switch between live HD video coverage, navigate to key moments within a session, and discover more with live data, statistics and information, while watching the action.

And video proved hugely popular, with 106m requests for video throughout the Games (62m for live streams, 8m for on-demand streams and 35m for clips), smashing the previous highs of 32m for the Beijing Games and 38m for the 2010 World Cup. New features such as chapter markings received an average 1.5 million clicks per day, with people using them to navigate instantly to key moments.

The top five most-requested events from Olympic live video streams on BBC Sport online included: Andy Murray and Serena Williams winning the Tennis Singles Finals, Bradley Wiggins winning the Men’s Cycling Time-Trial and Athletics Heats including Jessica Ennis in the Heptathlon. And the Opening Ceremony has continued to be one of the most popular programmes on BBC Online, with 3.9 million requests to view on either BBC iPlayer or the BBC Sport website to date.

Popular video clips included German diver, Steven Feck’s nightmare ‘zero point’ dive with over 830,000 requests, Cuban pole vaulter, ?Lazaro Borges’ pole snapping mid-vault with 420,000 requests, and Usain Bolt storming to victory in the 100m final with over 429,000 requests.

Phil Fearnley, General Manager – News and Knowledge, BBC Future Media, said: “Our aspiration was that just as the Coronation did for TV in 1953, the Olympics would do for digital in 2012. The demand and astonishing feedback we’ve seen from audiences accessing our Olympics content online, whenever they want, on the devices they choose, has exceeded our expectations and helped fulfil this aspiration. We promised audiences would never miss a moment of the Games. We delivered on our promise and will build on this to leave a lasting digital legacy for audiences in years to come.”

Ben Gallop, Head of Interactive for BBC Sport, said: “Our home Olympics was a special time for the whole UK and it’s been really pleasing for BBC Sport to have given our audience the chance to enjoy all that amazing action. There have been some great stories of people following Team GB’s rowing success at the shopping centre or watching Usain Bolt when they’re on the beach. We like to think it was the ultimate Olympic choice: on-demand and on-the-move.”

Traffic to bbc.co.uk rocketed throughout the Games, with the BBC delivering 2.8 petabytes on the busiest day. Streaming quality was the highest the BBC has ever delivered online, averaging over 1 megabit per second. The peak traffic moment was on 1 August 2012, at over 700 gigabits per second – the day Bradley Wiggins stormed to victory.

With the 2012 London Olympic Games on the horizon, Olympic sponsor GE announced the launch of a new Facebook app called HealthyShare, a new tool for people to share health goals, track progress against goals and use friends as sources of inspiration and motivation toward better health.

The app makes it easier for consumers to kick start their health goals using the 17 days of the Olympic Games as a time to stay motivated around improving their health.

“Whether your goal is to lose weight, walk more or pursue an Olympic dream, GE believes that your friends can be good for your health. We want to give consumers a platform to get motivated around better health tapping into the Olympic spirit,” said Linda Boff, global executive director, digital, advertising and design, GE. “HealthyShare makes it easy for consumers to take something they are already doing – interacting with their friends online – and extend it in a fun and meaningful way around getting healthier.”

Paul Adams, global head of brand design for Facebook said, “Many research studies show that our friends can help us live healthier lives. By supporting each other, we increase people’s motivation, helping them meet their goals of feeling better, and being healthier and happier. This new tool by GE is the first step in a vision to help people be healthier by interacting with their friends. The plan is to learn quickly from this release and continually improve this tool together in the coming months.”

The initial phase of the HealthyShare app is focused on fitness and helping people achieve and exceed their health and well-being goals one step at a time with the support of their online community and a little inspiration from Olympians.

GE is the exclusive provider of a wide range of innovative products and services that are integral to staging a successful Olympic Games. GE works closely with host countries, cities and organizing committees to provide infrastructure solutions for Olympic venues including power, lighting, water treatment and transportation.

Northern Racing Limited has appointed Generate Sponsorship to provide sponsorship rights analysis and evaluation across the company’s property portfolio.

Northern Races Ltd is a group of ten racecourses across the UK, which includes venues such as Chepstow, Uttoxeter and Fontwell Park.

Generate Sponsorship will now be responsible for developing and implementing a strategy to attract sponsorship deals for all the racecourses in the group.

Generate will have their work cut out, as it was recently announced that television viewing figures for Royal Ascot had fallen, with the audience for the Golden Jubilee race peaking at just one million. That was half the amount of people that watched the same race last year.

The Athletics Australia will have a new President and Chairman after David Grace QC was unanimously appointed to the role by the Board of Directors.

Set to replace the outgoing Rob Fildes OAM, denture Grace has been involved with the sport of track and field for nearly 50 years. A competitor in interclub, state and national competitions as a sprinter and jumper, he has also been involved in coaching and administration at the Ajax Maccabi Athletics Club in Melbourne. He is a life member of that club.

Grace joined the Athletics Australia Board of Directors in 2006, with his responsibilities regularly relying upon his extensive experience in judicial matters relating to sport and its governance.  

He has been the Vice President alongside Nick Moore since 2011, with his involvement in our national sporting organisation commencing after his appointment as the Chairperson of the Athletics Australia Tribunal (2001-2006).

The Principal of his own individual law practice that specialises in appellate advocacy, Grace has also worked collaboratively with a group of lawyers to establish a large criminal, administrative and sports law practice in Melbourne. 

“My appointment as the President of Athletics Australia is something that I am very excited about, and I look forward to tackling the many challenges we face as a sport alongside a very capable team of Directors,” Grace said.

“While the pursuit of a possible merge with Little Athletics Australia will remain a key priority, it is important that we as a sport continue to execute our strong plans in the areas of able-bodied and para-athletics high performance, coaching development, competition and participation. It is vital that we work hard to assist in the delivery of the Australian Institute of Sport’s Winning Edge program and extremely important that while we continue to operate independently as Athletics Australia we explore all avenues that could lead to improved commercial viability for the sport.

“Athletics is something that has been in my blood for half a century, and I will bring an extensive understanding of our sport’s landscape to the role. I am looking forward to working alongside my capable Board of Directors, and the track and field community as a whole, for the betterment of the sport long term.”

Grace also lauded the performance of Fildes as President of Athletics Australia, and wishes him the best of luck in his future endeavours.

“Rob has been a true servant of athletics in Australia and I congratulate him on a job well done. He has left the sport in a much stronger position than when he took the reigns in 2005, with healthy capital reserves and a strong relationship with our key partners including the Australian Sports Commission, the IAAF, the Australian Olympic and Paralympic Committees and the Australian Commonwealth Games Association,” Grace added.

“I have no doubt that Rob’s retirement from the Board of Directors does not mean a complete retirement from the sport and I look forward to sharing the journey to Glasgow 2014, Rio 2016 and beyond with him in whatever capacity he chooses to remain involved.”

Fildes retirement comes after a eight-year tenure as President of Athletics Australia. 

A strong advocate for the merge discussions with Little Athletics Australia, Fildes has been extensively involved in the development of Athletics House at Lakeside Stadium, as well as the establishment of the IAAF Melbourne World Challenge as a fixture on the IAAF World Challenge series.

“It has been a very rewarding journey as the President of Athletics Australia and I thank my fellow Directors for allowing me to continue in the role for the period that I have,” Fildes said.

“I am proud of the position in which I will leave the sport for the next generation of leaders and I look forward to working alongside David and his team in a less formal capacity as we pursue the vital undertaking of working towards becoming one sport.

“Athletics Australia is a fantastic organisation to be involved with and I am confident that it will continue to develop and succeed in the years to come. It has embraced the Australian Institute of Sport’s Winning Edge program and continues to develop in the areas of coaching and participation. The sport is stronger now than it has been in many years and this is a humbling result given the extensive time that my fellow Directors and I contribute alongside the capable team of executive management and staff.” 

Grace commences his role as President and Chairman of Athletics Australia immediately. 

Matthew Mahon was also promoted and he will now take on the role of Vice President of Athletics Australia alongside the incumbent Moore. The Board of Directors also includes Anne Lord, Melissa Babbage, Peter Bromley and Nathan Deakes.