Tokyo 2020 Organizing Committee CEO, Toshiro Muto, underscoring his team’s belief in the future success of the new sports, outlined their myriad benefits, as local media here reported.
Advertisement
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) voted unanimously on Thursday to include skateboarding in the 2020 Summer Games in Tokyo.
Men’s baseball was a full part of the Olympic program from 1992 to 2008, with women’s softball joining in 1996.
“As the official decision has been made now, the next stage for us as the organising committee is to fully engage with relevant people in the baseball community” to bring the top talents to the Tokyo Games, he said.
After including sport climbing as one of the demonstration sports in the Youth Olympic Games held in Nanjing, China past year, it is now officially a part of the list of Olympic Games.
The IOC president, Thomas Bach, who insisted this week that the Russian doping crisis had not harmed the Olympics, said: “We want to take sport to the youth“.
“You have to go, and sport has to go, to where they are and with this organisation we go to where the young people are so I’m extremely pleased with this proposal”. “We want to take sport to the youth“, said Thomas Bach, the International Olympic Committee president. At Rio, which is excitingly just days away from launching, golf was added for the first time since 1904 with much fanfare, but several huge sports were left out.
But they may not have to worry too much; the sports may not be permanent additions to the Olympic Games, according to USA Today.
Among the new Olympic sports approved on Wednesday for the 2020 Games in Tokyo is surfing.
“Surfing’s inclusion into the Olympics would be a dream come true for our sport”. They last featured at the Olympics in Beijing in 2008 before being taken off the programme and missing the 2012 and the 2016 Games.
Baseball will have a six-team tournament in Tokyo, short of the eight-team format sought by officials from the sports global federation.
The IOC called it “the most comprehensive evolution of the Olympic program in modern history”. They also agreed to add karate, skateboarding, sport climbing and surfing as new events. In fact, the World Karate Federation celebrates this new milestone, with the federation’s website describing the occasion as “a moment of great joy for Karate”. Karate will have 80 athletes competing in mens and womens Kumite and Kata events, while surfing will have two shortboard events for 40 competitors.
Advertisement
Meanwhile, sports climbing will also be held in urban Tokyo, it will feature men’s and women’s competitions for bouldering, lead and speed combined.
