“We’re not surprised because we knew about six weeks ago that the International Olympic Committee had approved and recommended softball and baseball be included”, said Greg Timm, president of the local White Rock Renegades softball association as well as chair of last month’s Women’s World Softball Championships, which were held in South Surrey. “They need skateboarding more than we need them. They just want to make money off of something we love and live for”.
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Baseball and softball, which will each have a competition involving six teams, last featured at the Olympics in Beijing in 2008 before being taken off the programme and missing the 2012 and the 2016 Games.
Bringing baseball back for the 2020 Olympics made sense because it is among the most popular sports in Japan.
In what has been described by the IOC as “the most comprehensive evolution” of the schedule in Olympic history, karate, skateboarding, sports climbing, surfing and baseball/softball were added. “The recommendation to give Organising Committees the flexibility to propose new sports for their edition of the Games was meant to put even more focus on innovation, flexibility and youth in the development Olympic programme”, said the IOC in a statement.
Surfing, with 20 men and 20 women athletes, will take place in the sea, instead of on artificial waves, likely in the Prefecture of Chiba.
But while the vote was officially unanimous, there were voices of dissent from the floor of the IOC’s 129th session, with several members pointing out that baseball’s best players are unlikely to attend as the American professional leagues have not agreed to suspend play and few expect them to.
And Beachley is not concerned the sport will run into the same problems as the Olympic reintroduction of golf has this year, where a number of the world’s top ranked players have withdrawn from Rio.
Wednesday’s decision ends a more than year-long process which whittled down 26 applications and dropped squash, bowling and wushu – a Chinese martial art from an earlier shortlist.
“We believe the five sports deliver significant benefits, including worldwide youth appeal and great added value to Tokyo 2020 overall”, organizing committee director general Toshiro Muto said.
Discussions on the event programme in the existing 28 Olympic sports for the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 are ongoing and will be finalised by the IOC Executive Board in mid-2017. Japan won the final gold prior to the sport’s removal from the games.
Climbing will reportedly feature two categories for both men and women: bouldering and a combined lead and speed. In 1984, in Los Angeles, baseball was only a demonstration sport, but Mark McGwire and Will Clark were introduced to many of us.
If the sport’s stars do not come to Tokyo, he mused “perhaps it will be hard for baseball to be included in future”.
“Our Olympic dream has now become a reality”, International Surfing Association president Fernando Aguerre said.
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It’s the sixth time the Committee has considered surfing for the Games.
