Olympics of 2008

[Carol]

Word is out of the IOC meeting about sports proposed for in or out of
the Olympics in Bejing of 2008:

IN: Golf, Rugby

OUT: Baseball, Softball, Greco-Roman Wrestling, Some of the
Equestrian events (I did wonder how they could organize the 3-day event
in China)

Final decision of what is out/in will happen in November. Looks like
fencing is doing well with what we have been getting compared to other
sports.

Also, the final selection for the winter games of 2010 has been narrowed
down to the following: Vancouver, Berne, Salzbourg, and Pyeongchang
(South Korea). Final decision will be made in July 2003.

My bet is on either Vancouver or Salzbourg -- which ever gets the
winter, the other continent will get the 2012 Summer Olympics. If North
America, the candidates in the running are NYC, San Francisco or
Toronto.

My bet for the final decision would be that since last year's winter was
in Salt Lake, the winter must go to Europe (because Pyeongchang is a
very weak candidate), so it would be Salzbourg. That would leave the
Summer to North America, and since the US had LA '84 and Atlanta '96,
and Canada last had Montreal '76, they would have to pick Toronto
(which, in this day and age, did a very good job of security with the
Pope's visit).

[Amy & Joseph Kormann]

Carol wrote:
> My bet for the final decision would be that since last year's winter was
> in Salt Lake, the winter must go to Europe (because Pyeongchang is a
> very weak candidate), so it would be Salzbourg. That would leave the
> Summer to North America, and since the US had LA '84 and Atlanta '96,
> and Canada last had Montreal '76, they would have to pick Toronto
> (which, in this day and age, did a very good job of security with the
> Pope's visit).

Do you think that the 9/11 issue will sway any of the votes?

Good analysis. I'd place money you'll be right.

Thanks for the info.
--
Amy and Joseph Kormann

[Carol]

Amy & Joseph Kormann wrote:

> Do you think that the 9/11 issue will sway any of the votes?

Probably half-half -- half for yes, to show moral support and a global
unity; half for no, because of security reasons (which, by the way
security at the US Open is going, should be a non-concern).

> Good analysis. I'd place money you'll be right.

Thanks. Let's see how the political dust settles.

> Thanks for the info.

You're welcome <g>

[William Marshal]

I had heard they were also considering dropping modern pentathlon and
race-walking. Were these spared, or or still to be considered for the
axe?

[Carol]

Those didn't make it to the newscast, but probably could be -- I know
they want (need?) to limit equestrian events, so pentathlon could be on
the list -- we'll know for sure after the November meeting of the IOC
in Mexico City.

William Marshal wrote:
>
> I had heard they were also considering dropping modern pentathlon and
> race-walking. Were these spared, or or still to be considered for the
> axe?

[mrfencer]

Dans le message <dc7987e.0209021721.7901ce73@posting.google.com> du 2
Sep 2002 18:21:44 -0700, William Marshal déclama la prose suivante
|I had heard they were also considering dropping modern pentathlon and
|race-walking. Were these spared, or or still to be considered for the
|axe?
|
From IOC website :

IOC REVIEWS SPORTING PROGRAMME FOR FUTURE GAMES OF THE OLYMPIAD
http://www.olympic.org/uk/news/publi...sp?release=308

--
Pour répondre :
mrfencer[at]fnac[dot]net

[mrfencer]

Dans le message <dc7987e.0209021721.7901ce73@posting.google.com> du 2
Sep 2002 18:21:44 -0700, William Marshal déclama la prose suivante
|I had heard they were also considering dropping modern pentathlon and
|race-walking. Were these spared, or or still to be considered for the
|axe?
|
From IOC website :

http://www.olympic.org/uk/news/publi...sp?release=308

IOC REVIEWS SPORTING PROGRAMME FOR FUTURE GAMES OF THE OLYMPIAD

29 August 2002

Following its review yesterday of the Olympic programme for the
Olympic Winter Games in Turin in 2006, the IOC Executive Board today
discussed the Olympic programme for future Games of the Olympiad,
specifically the Games of the XXIX Olympiad in 2008 in Beijing. A total
of 18 sports for the programme of the Summer Games have been submitted
to the Olympic Programme Commission by their relevant International
Federations for inclusion in future Games.

The Executive Board decided NOT TO ADMIT the following sports, which had
made a request for inclusion into the Olympic Programme of the Games of
the Olympiad:

Roller sports (FIRS)
Polo (FIP)
Surfing (ISA)
Bridge (WBF)
Chess (FIDE)
Air sports (FAI)
Billiards (WCBS)
Boules (CMSB)
Dance sport (IDSF)
Bowling (FIQ)
Racquetball (IRF)
Water ski (IWSF)
Squash (WSF)
Underwater sports (CMAS)

It was decided that the request from the International Wushu Federation
(IWUF) will be further studied.

Decisions on inclusion/exclusion of sports will be made during the 114th
IOC Session in Mexico in November. Changes regarding disciplines and
events will be further discussed during future Executive Board meetings.

The full Olympic Programme Commission's report, explaining the
Commission's recommendations and outlining the criteria against which
summer sport, disciplines and events have been judged can be found
below.

Discover the Olympic Programme Commission's report:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pdf/en_report_527.pdf
--
Pour répondre :
mrfencer[at]fnac[dot]net

[David Neevel]

The full PDF copy of the report should be read-- it looks like the knives
are indeed out for modern pentathalon. Additionally, there's a paragraph
which specifically recommends that team events of individual sports be
reviewed if any further need to reduce the number of events is found.


-Dave

mrfencer wrote:

> Dans le message <dc7987e.0209021721.7901ce73@posting.google.com> du 2
> Sep 2002 18:21:44 -0700, William Marshal déclama la prose suivante
> |I had heard they were also considering dropping modern pentathlon and
> |race-walking. Were these spared, or or still to be considered for the
> |axe?
> |
> From IOC website :
>
> IOC REVIEWS SPORTING PROGRAMME FOR FUTURE GAMES OF THE OLYMPIAD
> http://www.olympic.org/uk/news/publi...sp?release=308
>
> --
> Pour répondre :
> mrfencer[at]fnac[dot]net

[David Neevel]

The full PDF copy of the report should be read-- it looks like the knives
are indeed out for modern pentathalon. Additionally, there's a paragraph
which specifically recommends that team events of individual sports be
reviewed if any further need to reduce the number of events is found.


-Dave

mrfencer wrote:

> Dans le message <dc7987e.0209021721.7901ce73@posting.google.com> du 2
> Sep 2002 18:21:44 -0700, William Marshal déclama la prose suivante
> |I had heard they were also considering dropping modern pentathlon and
> |race-walking. Were these spared, or or still to be considered for the
> |axe?
> |
> From IOC website :
>
> IOC REVIEWS SPORTING PROGRAMME FOR FUTURE GAMES OF THE OLYMPIAD
> http://www.olympic.org/uk/news/publi...sp?release=308
>
> --
> Pour répondre :
> mrfencer[at]fnac[dot]net

[Joe Hoffman]

Particularly galling to me was this line, from the "Key Principles to
be Reflected in the Olympic Programme":
=

The admission of a new sport to the Olympic Programme can only
be considered if the sport is practiced by both men and women.
However, sports must not necessarily be represented by both
men and women in the Olympic Programme.

What flaming hypocrisy! You can hear the voice of Jim Crow, still
alive and well. Every bigot in history has said something similar
once he figured out that everyone else in the room disagreed with
him. "Sure, I like women. Some of my best friends are women. =

I just wouldn't want my son to marry one."

Joe

David Neevel wrote:
> =

> The full PDF copy of the report should be read-- it looks like the kniv=
es
> are indeed out for modern pentathalon. Additionally, there's a paragrap=
h
> which specifically recommends that team events of individual sports be
> reviewed if any further need to reduce the number of events is found.
> =

> -Dave
> =

> mrfencer wrote:
> =

> > Dans le message <dc7987e.0209021721.7901ce73@posting.google.com> du 2=

> > Sep 2002 18:21:44 -0700, William Marshal d=E9clama la prose suivante
> > |I had heard they were also considering dropping modern pentathlon an=
d
> > |race-walking. Were these spared, or or still to be considered for th=
e
> > |axe?
> > |
> > From IOC website :
> >
> > IOC REVIEWS SPORTING PROGRAMME FOR FUTURE GAMES OF THE OLYMPIAD
> > http://www.olympic.org/uk/news/publi...?release=3D30=
8
> >
> > --
> > Pour r=E9pondre :
> > mrfencer[at]fnac[dot]net

[HaroldBuck]

>
> The admission of a new sport to the Olympic Programme can only
> be considered if the sport is practiced by both men and women.
> However, sports must not necessarily be represented by both
> men and women in the Olympic Programme.
>
>What flaming hypocrisy! You can hear the voice of Jim Crow, still
>alive and well. Every bigot in history has said something similar
>once he figured out that everyone else in the room disagreed with
>him. "Sure, I like women. Some of my best friends are women. =
>
>I just wouldn't want my son to marry one."

I don't think it's *THAT* hypocritical. It seems that they're excluding sports
which are by nature exclusionary. However, if there's a sport played by men and
women, but it's very popular with men and not with women--or vice versa--then
it shouldn't be contested by both at the Olympics.

Off the top of my head, the only thing I see this excluding is tackle
(American) football, although there actually *is* a tiny semi-pro women's
league now.

Oh, and I guess sports like baseball/softball are close enough that they'd be
able to get in.

In the name of equality, would you want every single-sex sport in the Olympics
either excised or coupled with an opposite gender event? (I know that's not
what's being suggested by the IOC report.) If you don't, aren't you being
hypocritical yourself?

-Harold

-Harold

[Carol]

No, not hypocrisy; this is more addressing a sport such as boxing -- and why
women's boxing wouldn't be admitted into the olympic games -- boxing says you
must admit it on gender equity; IOC is saying that there is specific crrteria
for whether a sport gets admitted -- and it is different for men and women,
along the lines that it must be routinely practice on X number of continents
by Y minimum number of countries. It is just clarifying that a sport, whether
men or women, needs to be practiced by at least a threshold level of
countries/continents in order to be considered for inclusion -- it is nice to
have gender equity, however, it is necessary to at least have a certain level
of participation.

Joe Hoffman wrote:

> Particularly galling to me was this line, from the "Key Principles to
> be Reflected in the Olympic Programme":
>
> The admission of a new sport to the Olympic Programme can only
> be considered if the sport is practiced by both men and women.
> However, sports must not necessarily be represented by both
> men and women in the Olympic Programme.
>
> What flaming hypocrisy! You can hear the voice of Jim Crow, still
> alive and well. Every bigot in history has said something similar
> once he figured out that everyone else in the room disagreed with
> him. "Sure, I like women. Some of my best friends are women.
> I just wouldn't want my son to marry one."
>

[Dieter Schlaepfer]

You all might want to read the IOC report before getting too hot under
the collar. I thought that the committee's principles and conclusions to
be reasonably balanced and realistic. See

http://multimedia.olympic.org/pdf/en_report_527.pdf

I wonder whether the IOC should consider adding a Spring Olympics event
for the newer sports. According to the IOC report, the number of
competing Olympic athletes has doubled over the last 20 years, making it
a logistical and security nightmare. This would spread things out.

While it might be easy to criticize the IOC for catering to "popular"
sports, it's easy to see that viewer interest should be part of the
decision. Conversely, I deplore the lack of diversity in media coverage
of "minor" sports.

Naturally, I won't mention the infuriatingly inane and suffocating style
of Olympic coverage here in the U.S.

Dieter

[HaroldBuck]

>
>I wonder whether the IOC should consider adding a Spring Olympics event
>for the newer sports. According to the IOC report, the number of
>competing Olympic athletes has doubled over the last 20 years, making it
>a logistical and security nightmare. This would spread things out.

I thought about this once and quickly realized the problem: if you do a spring
Olympics for "wannabe" sports, then you don't have any events to anchor the
coverage (e.g., track, gymnastics, basketball, etc.). Without those anchor
events, U.S. TV ratings go down, which means advertising rates go down, which
means revenue goes down, which means the IOC can't afford to do it.

>While it might be easy to criticize the IOC for catering to "popular"
>sports, it's easy to see that viewer interest should be part of the
>decision. Conversely, I deplore the lack of diversity in media coverage
>of "minor" sports.

Yeah, me too. I wrote a letter to NBC asking them to diversify their Olympics
coverage, and also one to ESPN praising their decision to start a network
catering to college sports (all of them, not just the big ones).

>Naturally, I won't mention the infuriatingly inane and suffocating style
>of Olympic coverage here in the U.S.
>

You just did.

-Harold

[John Twernbold]

HaroldBuck wrote:
> if you do a spring Olympics for "wannabe" sports, then you don't have
> any events to anchor the coverage (e.g., track, gymnastics,
> basketball, etc.).

Not necessarily--you could juggle them around a bit so that each games have
the same number of popular "anchor" events. For example, move gymnastics
and basketball to the "spring" Olympics, along with new events like
racquetball and... chess?


--
John Twernbold
jtwernbold (at) yahoo.com

[John Hasler]

John Twernbold writes:
> For example, move gymnastics and basketball to the "spring" Olympics,
> along with new events like racquetball and... chess?

Start down that road and pretty soon you'll have fall, winter, spring, and
summer Olympics: one every year. Can we stand that much hype?
--
John Hasler
john@dhh.gt.org
Dancing Horse Hill
Elmwood, Wisconsin

[HaroldBuck]

>
>HaroldBuck wrote:
>> if you do a spring Olympics for "wannabe" sports, then you don't have
>> any events to anchor the coverage (e.g., track, gymnastics,
>> basketball, etc.).
>
>Not necessarily--you could juggle them around a bit so that each games have
>the same number of popular "anchor" events.

None of the popular sports are going to be willing to do this, and they have
too much clout for the IOC to piss them off by forcing the move.

For example, move gymnastics
>and basketball to the "spring" Olympics, along with new events like
>racquetball and... chess?

Racquetball did not make the cut this time, and the IOC is proposing amending
the charter to exclude "mind sports" like chess *permanently*.

-Harold

[John Twernbold]

HaroldBuck wrote:
> None of the popular sports are going to be willing to do this, and
> they have too much clout for the IOC to piss them off by forcing the
> move.

What is gymnastics going to do, withdraw from the Olympics entirely? And
will all the gymnasts simply go "pro" instead? ;-)

Such an expansion would probably never happen anyway, but I'm sure it would
be possible to work out such minor issues in order to balance the different
Games and ensure an enjoyable program. Hell, maybe they'd even show a
little fencing on TV!

> Racquetball did not make the cut this time

I know, that's why I used it as an example of a sport which could be added
if the games were expanded. And it's too bad it didn't make the cut--I
think Olympic racquetball would be a lot of fun to watch.


--
John Twernbold
jtwernbold (at) yahoo.com

[Don Badowski]

> I had heard they were also considering dropping modern pentathlon and
> race-walking. Were these spared, or or still to be considered for the
> axe?

My coach, Ina Harizanova, 1st Place, World Cup in Modern Pentathlon,
1994, asked me to post this for her.
-------------------------------
Hi everyone,

Discarding modern pentathlon is still to be decided. It's been only
recommended by the IOC program committee. We don't exactly know why.

Pentathlon sold out at the last two Olympic Games. Its Olympic
participation, World and European Championships and World Cups have
been often on TV especially in Europe. There is no extra cost of
building new facilities for the competition, since they already exist
for the other sports. The sport is very popular and there are more
than 75 countries members of the UIPM and over 200 athletes are
allowed to compete at the World Championships if they qualify.

We have people like Prince Albert and Samaranch's son involved with
the international organization (UIPM). We also have a strong
administrative body that has worked hard at all levels to improve the
competition format and TV presentation of the sport.

It's has been suggested that pentathlon should be replaced by golf. Do
you know who plays golf? Does it mean that if you have money you can
have everything and discard a traditional sport embodying the very
spirit of the Olympics?

Ina Harizanova

[Joe Hoffman]

Hrmph. (Onomatopoeic for someone hot under the collar.)

It's important that women fence, they just shouldn't expect
to do it in the Olympics.

Here's another one: "The Commission noted the simplicity
to understand and follow the sport of golf, and the very high
spectator and broadcast appeal of this sport. ... The WAGC
must guarantee the participation of the best athletes in the
Olympic Games, should golf be admitted."

I wonder why they bothered to use the plural form of "athletes"?

We can see Tiger Woods every weekend in the summer, and
tennis is shown just as often, and we can see NBA players
every night in the winter, so what's the point? Shouldn't
there be a venue for the sports that aren't always on TV?

As I've said before, the Olympics is no longer an athletic
competition. It's just another TV show. This document seems
to make sure it'll be a re-run.

Joe
--------------------
Dieter Schlaepfer wrote:
>
> You all might want to read the IOC report before getting too hot under
> the collar. I thought that the committee's principles and conclusions to
> be reasonably balanced and realistic. See
>
> http://multimedia.olympic.org/pdf/en_report_527.pdf
>
> I wonder whether the IOC should consider adding a Spring Olympics event
> for the newer sports. According to the IOC report, the number of
> competing Olympic athletes has doubled over the last 20 years, making it
> a logistical and security nightmare. This would spread things out.
>
> While it might be easy to criticize the IOC for catering to "popular"
> sports, it's easy to see that viewer interest should be part of the
> decision. Conversely, I deplore the lack of diversity in media coverage
> of "minor" sports.
>
> Naturally, I won't mention the infuriatingly inane and suffocating style
> of Olympic coverage here in the U.S.
>
> Dieter