Roush will be co-ordinating the provision of services to National Olympic Committees and Governmental agencies involved in supporting elite sports programmes.

 

He will be based at a new TSE Consulting office in Colorado Springs, which will become the company's office in the US, the first being established in Indianapolis in 2006 and headed by director of TSE Consulting USA, Dale Neuburger.

 

Roush said: "Following eight wonderful and exciting years at the USOC, I am now very much looking forward to moving into consulting.

 

"TSE Consulting was the obvious choice for me and during our preliminary discussions I have been very impressed with their professionalism and their vision.

 

"I think that my many years of experience at the highest level of sports performance can be useful to many National Olympic Committees and I immediately look forward to assisting TSE clients around the world in optimising their elite sports programmes and their preparations for the London 2012 Olympic Games and other important events in the future."

 

Roush resigned from the USOC last month.

 

His decision to step down came five months after the Beijing Olympics, where he got entangled in a controversy involving cyclists who wore masks upon their arrival at the airport in the Chinese capital.

 

The cyclists complained they were treated rudely by Roush, who they said threatened to revoke their Olympic eligibility if they did not issue an apology for offending their hosts.

 

The USOC drafted a letter of apology, acknowledging that parts of the meeting with Roush were handled poorly.

 

But the athletes remain unsatisfied, and held a news conference in which they called for him to be sacked.

 

Under Roush, the US won 102 medals at Athens in 2004, 25 at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin - a record for an American team in a Winter Olympics not held at home - then 110 in Beijing.

 

Before joining the USOC, Roush was a top executive at USA Swimming for six years, and before that had been an assistant swim coach at Northwestern and Wisconsin.

 

Lars Haue-Pedersen, the managing director of TSE Consulting, whose main offices are in Lausanne, said: "We have for some time now been keen to offer advice on sports performance to our clients among National Olympic Committees and Ministries of Sport, but we will never enter a new field of business unless we are sure that we can provide first class advice to our clients.

 

"With Steve joining TSE we are now in a position to offer the very best in class in this area.

 

"We are very excited about the opportunities that this new business line provides for many of our clients and we are extremely pleased that one of the world's leading experts in the field has chosen TSE for the next steps of his career."