Sports for 2016: Karate

The World Karate Championships will be held in Tokyo this week.(KHALED DESOUKI/AFP/Getty Images) The Program Commission comes on the same week as the 19th World Karate Championships in Tokyo, which will be held Thursday through Saturday, with around 100 countries being represented and around 1,000 competitors expected to participate.

Karate is represented by the World Karate Federation (WKF), which has its headquarters in Madrid, Spain. WKF membership includes 180 national federations.

President of WKF is Antonio Espinos of Italy, First Vice President is William Millerson of Netherlands Antilles. George Yerolimpos of Greece is General Secretary.

Important nations for the sport include France, Italy, Japan, Russia, South Korea, Spain, Turkey and the United States.

Karate was recently reinstated as a full medal sport for the 2011 Pan American Games in Guadalajara, Mexico.

The popularity of karate in Tokyo, one of the candidate cities for the 2016 Games, is considered to be one of the advantages that the sport has in its favor.

Karate is also achieving increased popularity in Africa and the Middle East.

The format for the Olympic karate competition includes five categories each in both the men’s and women’s competitions, with 120 competitors in each category.

Karate is divided into two disciplines: kumite and kata. Kumite is a form of sparring, where fighters earn points Women would also be part of the karate competition at the 2016 Games. (KHALED DESOUKI/AFP/Getty Images)by throwing kicks, punches or tossing their opponents to the mat. This is the discipline proposed for the Olympics.

Kata is a demonstration-type event with no opponent that is judged by how well a competitor performs the maneuvers.

Only President Antonio Espinos will represent the federation at the Program Commission due to the world championships, as other WKF leaders must remain in Tokyo for the world championships.

The federation website is www.wkf.net.

Written by Greg Oshust.