One thing above all else characterised the Summer of 2021. The power of athletes using the unique platform that they have to drive social change. That’s it. 

To say World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) meetings in recent years have been fractious would be an understatement the size of the deceit carried out by Russia with its infamous doping programme.

No one should be surprised to learn that Lord Sebastian Coe is vehemently opposed to boycotts. He made this abundantly clear yet again in a recent interview with the Today Programme when asked whether the upcoming Winter Olympics in Beijing should be shunned because of China's wretched record on human rights, culminating in the ongoing mystery over the welfare of its leading female tennis player, Peng Shuai.

And so, as revealed in a noteworthy exclusive by my insidethegames colleague Liam Morgan, the Global Association of International Sports Federations (GAISF) may be set for the scrapheap.

Can it be really be less than a week since the International Olympic President Thomas Bach, minus mask in order to address the Smart Cities & Sport Summit in Copenhagen, joked about feeling "naked" without it, and warmly welcomed the return to face-to-face meetings, with all their "body language"?

Should you need quiet diplomacy with an upcoming Olympic host to ascertain whether an athlete is safe?

My name is Joe Choong. I competed at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics in modern pentathlon, and over the last few months I’ve been busy enjoying the benefits of coming home with a gold medal. 

It is well over a century since Rudyard Kipling wrote The Islanders. It was a poem which spoke of "flannelled fools at the wicket or the muddied oafs at the goals".

Starting a family and being an elite athlete should not be mutually exclusive - that is what we want to make abundantly clear to everyone involved in the Olympic and Paralympic high-performance community, and beyond.

The fact that it needed International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Thomas Bach to make personal contact with the Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai and assure the world of her safety is a further example of how sport has established itself as a political player on the world stage. The mystery of her apparent temporary disappearance may remain unsolved for the moment but at least she appears to be in good health, physically at least.

If anyone still doubted that the interface between commerce and good governance is going to be one of the biggest stories in sport over the next decade, events of the past week or so may well have persuaded them to change their mind.

Over the years, writing up International Modern Pentathlon Union (UIPM) events, I’ve noticed an odd thing. The official picture accompanying reports tends to feature a line of officials in the foreground, often with the current President of the UIPM, Klaus Schormann, front and centre.

"I think it is not fair that a community so vast, so rich, dynamic in culture and friendship, cannot be given the same level of respect afforded to any other human walking down the street," International Esports Federation (IESF) President Vlad Marinescu says at the conclusion of the World Championship Finals in Eilat.

International Sambo Federation (FIAS) President Vasily Shestakov is used to being faced with doubters when voicing his lofty ambitions for the sport.