On November 30, an election is scheduled to be held during meetings of the International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) in Munich to choose a new President to follow in Olegario Vázquez Raña’s king-sized footprints.

The Mexican is stepping down at the age of almost 84, after occupying the post since 1980, the year in which Ronald Reagan was elected United States President and Robert Mugabe became Prime Minister of Zimbabwe.

With some three months to go, he is expected to be succeeded by Russian steel tycoon Vladimir Lisin. Vázquez Raña named Lisin, who is European Shooting Confederation President, earlier this year as his preferred candidate to take over.

In view of this impending exit - and on the eve of this year's ISSF World Shooting Championships, due to start in Changwon in South Korea on Friday (August 31) - it seemed an appropriate time for insidethegames to approach Vázquez Raña, who was also an International Olympic Committee (IOC) member for 20 years until 2015, to reflect on his six decades or more of dedication to this longstanding Olympic sport.

Like so much in life, it turns out his involvement began by chance. "I started shooting in the 1950s," he remembers. "A friend of mine, an engineer, invited me to dinner at his place on a Saturday night. There, I saw he had many trophies on display, and I asked him about it.

"It turned out that he was a shooter. I was curious about the sport, so he invited me to a competition on the following Sunday morning.

"I had never fired a shot before in my life, but I really wanted to try, so I entered a 150-metre rifle-shooting competition. Somebody explained to me how to shoot and I gave it a go.

"Later, when the judges had calculated the scores, the speaker called my name for a tie-breaker for the first and second. That was one of the biggest surprises of my life; I could not believe it.

"I went into the tie-breaker, I had a bit of luck, and I won it. I won the gold medal on my first try.

"That was the first time I touched a gun in my life.

"People said I was gifted; they encouraged me to start practising the sport, and indeed I started training. I fell in love with shooting sport.

"I was already a busy businessman in those days, so I trained in the morning - from 5.30 or 6am until eight o’clock, because at nine I had to be at my desk.

"After six or seven years, I became the best rifle shooter in Mexico. I broke all records and won all matches.

"In 1973, I won the Confederation of the Americas Shooting Championship in Mexico City with a new air-rifle world record of 392 points. Two years later, in 1975, I won the Pan American Games."

Vázquez Raña nominates this victory, in which he broke his own world record, as one of the proudest moments of his career as an athlete. He also participated in every Olympic Games between Tokyo 1964 and Montreal 1976. This latter event, in which he placed 10th in a small-bore rifle discipline, was where IOC President Thomas Bach picked up his Olympic fencing gold medal.

Given his extensive business interests, how I wondered, besides rising early, had Vázquez Raña managed to strike a balance? He begins by sketching out some of his family history.

"My father and mother came to Mexico from Spain at the turn of the previous century," he tells me. "My father worked a lot and the family grew. We were five brothers and one sister.

"Four of us founded a company named Grupo Hermanos Vázquez [Vázquez Brothers] that grew to become one of the most important companies in the country in the 1950s, 60s and 70s. That is where I started developing my business to what is now Grupo Empresarial Angeles."

Then he produces the answer: "I was able to balance business, sport and family through discipline.

"I believe firmly in discipline, and discipline has been a part of my life since I was a kid.

"I lived most of my life as if I were in the military.

"I trained early in the morning, then worked all day, and finally competed during the weekends. My family always followed me.

"My wife, son and daughters have seen most of the world’s shooting ranges, accompanying me during my years as an athlete. Now my son, Olegario Vázquez Aldir, has assumed the important roles in our companies.

"At the same time, my family, and especially my wife, continue travelling with me around the world for our sport meetings and championships."

Was he as much of a natural as a sports politician as he had been a shooting athlete? In short, not quite: "I was never interested in becoming part of the leadership of the Federation," he recalls. "I was in love with the sport as an active athlete, and that was all."

Then came the change. 

"In 1978 I was competing in the ISSF World Championship in Seoul," he says. "There I was also entered as a delegate for Mexico in the General Assembly held during the Championship. That was my first time in an Assembly and I was impressed by the organisation of the meetings.

"As the meeting started, the President and secretary general started a long discussion between themselves about some budgeting issues. This was a technical discussion which was of no interest for the 400 delegates in the hall.

"I raised my hand, asked to speak and expressed my point of view on the situation. I brought their attention back to the important issues: the rules, the competitions, the real problems concerning the athletes. I told them they should listen to the delegates and not discuss internal problems.

"Many delegates liked my speech and later on I was asked to become a candidate for the Presidency."

It was at a General Assembly in his native Mexico City in February 1980 that Vázquez Raña became President, at the age of 45. He secured 125 of the 132 votes present. I wondered if there was a particular promise that delegates had appreciated.

"I don’t think I made any special promises," he declares. "I believe that it was the right time for a change.

"I arrived with a lot of experience as an active and successful athlete. At the same time I brought my business experience into the administration of the sport.

"Managing the funds in a proper, professional and transparent manner has always been a priority for me. My team also played an important role. I am referring to secretary general Horst Schreiber [also elected in 1980] and José Antonio Fernández Arena, who helped me in the lead-up to the elections."

The Mexican has since served a total of nine terms as President, though he faced a tough fight in 2014, beating Kuwait’s Sheikh Salman Sabah Al-Salem Al-Homoud Al-Sabah by 165 votes to 128. What achievements is he proudest of in these nearly four decades in office?

"Shooting has always been a traditional sport," he replies. "I modernised the sport, its competition formats, its procedures and scoring systems, securing its Olympic status.

"Under my Presidency, we introduced finals - prior to that it took hours to declare the winners - the World Cup series, the Olympic quota system - we were the first! - electronic scoring systems and the mixed team events. We attained full gender equality in the Olympic programme, and so much more.

"It has not been easy. It took a long time. But I am sure I am leaving a healthy sport and a healthy Federation."

Some would say it is not healthy to have the same leader for so long, I observe.

"I have been confirmed as President mandate after mandate because I worked for the athletes, I worked for the sport, a sport I love," he responds. "I strengthened the position of shooting sport within the Olympic family.

"At the same time I modernised the sport. I was re-elected always thanks to the support of the shooting sport family.

"But now it is time to retire; I gave most of my life to this sport and I want now to spend more time with my family. Shooting will always be part of my life and of my dreams, but it is now time for me to retire.

"It is a difficult decision, but as I said, I believe in discipline.

"I am a man who makes firm decisions."

Schreiber remained as secretary general for three decades until his death in 2010. What, I wondered, were the qualities the German brought that enabled he and Vázquez Raña to work in tandem for so long?

The ISSF President replies that his "dear friend and partner" was "a well-prepared German lawyer. He was a strong man whose administrative skills proved very important during those years.

"He was very good at executing decisions, an exceptional problem-solver and he was respected by all who worked with him.

"Mr Schreiber was also a person I could talk to.

"I don’t like yes-men and I had several open discussions with him. Sometimes he was right; sometimes he wasn’t. In the end, we worked very well together. He was more than a colleague. He became a brother to me."

One of his flesh and blood brothers - the late Mario Vázquez Raña - was a towering figure in international sport in the Juan Antonio Samaranch era and beyond, serving as President of the Association of National Olympic Committees for 33 years and of the Pan American Sports Organization (PASO) for 40. Yet I developed the firm impression that the two brothers did not get on. Was this correct, or an unfounded rumour?

Vázquez Raña appears to answer carefully, but candidly. "We always had a deep love for each other, even though we didn’t always agree," he says.

"We each had a different style in regards to leadership, but we always respected each other. I am sure that healthy competition allowed us to do our best to succeed."

Shooting is one of those sports where there seems little reason  - at least to non-specialists such as myself = why men and women should not compete directly against one another. In the interests of gender equality, three men’s Olympic events are set to be replaced by mixed team competitions at Tokyo 2020. I thought it would be interesting to ask Vázquez Raña to reflect on how attitudes to competition between and among the sexes had evolved during his long involvement with the sport.

"In the past," he explains, "women and men competed together, in open events. We all remember the victory of the Chinese female shooter Zhang Shan in the open skeet event at the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona.

"That competition format had worked until then, but not for all events and not for all nations. After lengthy research and analysis by our experts, we decided to establish separate women’s events in order to increase female participation by offering more opportunities to compete at all levels.

"That proved to be a success as female participation increased. That being said, I always embraced the idea of gender equality, and therefore when Agenda 2020 was released I committed to it fully.

"We wanted to achieve full gender equality by Tokyo 2020, retaining our fifteen Olympic shooting events, and at the same time guaranteeing parity among the disciplines of rifle, pistol and shotgun.

"Mixed team events were the best solution to achieve it – and also to reflect grass-roots sport and youth events. We should not forget that we introduced mixed team shooting events in the Youth Olympic Games well before Agenda 2020."

Finally, I felt I needed to pose a question related to guns’ essential raison d’être as lethal weapons. What does the soon-to-depart ISSF President say to those who argue that it is no longer appropriate for a sport dependent on such dangerous weapons to be on the Olympic programme?

"We are an Olympic sport that is practised in more than 160 countries by millions of people," he tells me, adding: "Our sport is one of the safest in the world, and it is practised respecting the law and taking environmental precautions in areas and venues designed specifically for its practice.

"We are subject to controls and safety procedures at all levels, from international authorities down to referees on the range.

"Our guns are not dangerous weapons; they are sports equipment, not much different from a bow or a javelin."