In this space last week I suggested I might look into what sports should be added to the Olympics.
Well for 2020 the International Olympic Committee has announced five new sports will compete for medals.
Baseball for the men and softball for women return not surprisingly since they are popular in Tokyo which hosts in four years.
Ditto the reason to include karate.
Skateboard, sport climbing and surfing are the other additions.
“The decision by the 129th IOC Session in Rio de Janeiro was the most comprehensive evolution of the Olympic programme in modern history. Plans call for staging the skateboarding and sports climbing events in temporary venues installed in urban settings, marking a historic step in bringing the Games to young people and reflecting the trend of urbanisation of sport,” detailed www.olympic.org
“The recent vote was the culmination of a two-year process that began with the unanimous approval of the IOC’s strategic roadmap in 2014. The recommendation to give Organizing Committees the flexibility to propose new sports for their edition of the Games was intended to put even more focus on innovation, flexibility and youth in the development Olympic programme.
“Tokyo 2020, the first Organising Committee able to take advantage of the change, submitted its proposal for the five new sports to the IOC in September 2015.”
IOC President Thomas Bach said in the article, “We want to take sport to the youth. With the many options that young people have, we cannot expect any more that they will come automatically to us. We have to go to them. Tokyo 2020’s balanced proposal fulfils all of the goals of the Olympic Agenda 2020 recommendation that allowed it. Taken together, the five sports are an innovative combination of established and emerging, youth-focused events that are popular in Japan and will add to the legacy of the Tokyo Games.”
Tokyo 2020 President Yoshiro Mori said, “The inclusion of the package of new sports will afford young athletes the chance of a lifetime to realise their dreams of competing in the Olympic Games – the world’s greatest sporting stage – and inspire them to achieve their best, both in sport and in life.”
The additional sports in Tokyo will not impact the athlete or event quotas of existing Olympic sports or be binding on future host cities.
The IOC considered a variety of factors when assessing the proposal, including the impact on gender equality, the youth appeal of the sports and the legacy value of adding them to the Tokyo Games.
The inclusion of the new sports will add 18 events and 474 athletes, with equal numbers of women and men for all sports except baseball/softball, which will have the same number of teams but different player totals, because softball teams have 15 players whilst baseball teams have 24. Tokyo 2020 will rely heavily on existing and temporary venues to stage the competitions.
Discussions on the event programme in the existing 28 Olympic sports for the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 are ongoing, and will be finalized by the IOC Executive Board in mid-2017.
There was a selection process for sports bidding for inclusion in the 2020 and 2024 Olympic Games.
In June 2015, twenty-six International Olympic Committee (IOC) recognized Federations proposed events to be considered for inclusion at Tokyo: ‘baseball and softball’, karate, squash, bowling, snooker, sport climbing, surfing, wushu, roller sports, air sports, American football, bowls, bridge, chess, dancesport, floorball, flying disc, korfball, netball, orienteering, polo, racquetball, sumo, tug of war, underwater sports and water skiing. Only seven IOC-recognized sports did not apply: climbing and mountaineering, motorcycling, motor racing, cricket, basque pelota, lifesaving and powerboating.
New disciplines in pre-existing sports, like 3x3 basketball, were also apparently vying for inclusion.
The inclusion of flying disc sports on the lists, while recognizing it is likely far from being added to the games roster is exciting. I am an avid player and supporter of disc golf, and enjoy watching pro ultimate on YouTube.
While the list, found online is probably not complete, I do wish lacrosse was on it, in particular the box game, because Canada excels at it.
The field game would be more likely though since the IOC wants sports which are both male and female competitive.
Tug of war also intrigues. It was actually contested as a team event in the Summer Olympics at every Olympiad from 1900 to 1920.
It remains a competitive sport which is actually pretty intense to watch, whether one watches the outdoor, or indoor versions of the sport.
It could be that we have all tried the sport at some youth camp, or the fact team sports are my preferred interest, but this I would watch with interest.
Check it out in Canada at www.tugofwar.ca and internationally at www.tugofwar-twif.org (which even has an online magazine to the sport).
Also take a minute to check it out on YouTube.
I’m also a lover of snooker, and the fact no cue sport is in the Olympics, I’d vote for it.
Of course many sports looking to join the Olympics is variations on a theme. Floorball is a form of floor hockey.
Underwater sports include a form of hockey and of rugby among other disciplines.
Korfball has much in common with basketball.
Interestingly why roller sports mimic many skate sports, roller hockey apparently does not fall under the umbrella.
I will note here I welcome baseball back into the fold, as it remains a top-five sport in terms of interest for me.
Baseball at the Summer Olympics unofficially debuted at the 1904 Summer Games, and became an official Olympic sport at the 1992 Summer Olympics. The event was last played in the 2008 Olympics in Beijing with South Korea taking the gold.
“Although little was recorded, Olympic baseball first appeared in 1904 St. Louis. Eight years later in 1912 Stockholm, a United States team played against host Sweden, winning 13-3. Baseball was also played at the 1924 Summer Olympics in Paris, the American team beating the French team (the local Ranelagh Club) 5-0 in a four inning exhibition game. In 1936 Berlin, two United States teams played each other before approximately 90,000 - 100,000 spectators at the Reichsportsfeld,” details Wikipedia.
“The 1952 Helsinki event was a modified form of the sport, Finnish baseball, played by two Finnish teams. Australia played a one-game exhibition against the United States in 1956 Melbourne and Japan did the same in 1964 Tokyo.
“After a twenty-year hiatus, Olympic baseball (labelled an exhibition sport/event by the IOC) returned but with tournament formatting (1984 Los Angeles). In 1988 Seoul, it was termed a demonstration sport. Japan defeated the United States in the inaugural tournament finale in 1984. However, in 1988, the United States won over Japan.
“… At the IOC meeting on July 7, 2005, baseball and softball were voted out of the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, United Kingdom, becoming the first sports voted out of the Olympics since polo was eliminated from the1936 Olympics. The elimination excised 16 teams and more than 300 athletes from the 2012 Olympics. The two slots left available by the IOC’s elimination were subsequently filled by golf and rugby sevens in 2016.”
Next week, I’ll talk a bit about possible Winter Olympics’ sports, but that is a shorter list.
