IOC leaders dropped wrestling from the Olympic program on Tuesday, a surprise decision that removes one of the oldest Olympic sports from the 2020 Games.
The IOC executive board decided to retain modern pentathlon -- the event considered most at risk -- and remove wrestling instead from its list of 25 "core sports."
So as of 2020, there will be no more wrestling in the Olympics. Wrestling, of course, is an original sport. Original to the ancient Greeks, that is. Which kind of makes this decision hard to take. Well, it might come back.
Wrestling will now join seven other sports in applying for inclusion in 2020. The others are a combined bid from baseball and softball, plus karate, squash, roller sports, sport climbing, wakeboarding and wushu. They will be vying for a single opening in 2020.For those wondering, the host city for the 2020 Olympics will be chosen later this year, September 7th. There are three candidates: Istanbul, Madrid and Tokyo.
2 comments:
I was infuriated to learn this news; why the h*** would they include rock-climbing (or golf, for that matter) instead of wrestling?
The simple answer is 'ratings' and, while I watched a bunch of the Olympics last summer, I didn't watch any of the wrestling. But yeah, the tradition part is a big one. They'd be better served by expanding the total number of events, or simply limiting the of different martial arts.
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