This is only a proposal but it has every chance of being validated by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) at the end of June. (Editor’s note: the first study by the IOC will take place on March 28). The Organizing Committee for the 2024 Olympic Games (Cojo) announced this Thursday morning the additional sports it plans to add to the program currently reserved for 28 sports.
As expected, there will be 4 additional disciplines: climbing, skateboarding, surfing (already integrated into the Olympic program in Tokyo in 2020) and breakdance (for which it will be a first). Softball and karate, which will appear in Tokyo next year, should therefore disappear in stride.
The choice was difficult for the Cojo, which relied on a large list of 37 sports, recognized by the IOC and potentially candidates for integration. Criteria have weighed in the balance: the quota of 10,500 athletes imposed by the IOC (which has almost excluded team sports, such as softball which has every chance of returning in 2028 in Los Angeles!); the desire of the Olympic Committee to rejuvenate its audience and therefore to turn to trendy disciplines (skateboarding and breakdancing fall into this category); the desire of the Cojo not to build new sites for these additional sports and to organize the majority of the events in iconic sites.
On the model of the Olympic days organized in June 2017 which, three months before the attribution of the Games, had marked the spirits, one could therefore imagine the climbing or breakdance events organized in the heart of the capital, at the foot of monuments or of museums.
Other new tests under study
The sites in which the four additional disciplines will be organized will be known at the end of spring. Arena 2 which, at Porte de la Chapelle, will host badminton, is a base for one of them. Promises were made at Seine-Saint-Denis, when the site map was redone and two sports (badminton and water polo) moved. Biarritz-Cap Breton and Lacanau are candidates to host the surfing events.
Finally, if four sports are added to the official program, the arrival of new events is also under study. Offshore racing, mixed relays in athletics should make their appearance. The international federations continue to work to make the Olympics more attractive. Among the tracks, the arrival, for example, of cross-country. With a non-negotiable criterion in mind: no more than 10,500 athletes in total, which means that the appearance of new events will inevitably lead to the disappearance of others.