Badminton Restructures Tournament Schedule -- Federations Focus

(ATR) The Badminton World Federation is dividing its yearly tournaments into tiers separated by the prestige and amount of prize money available at each of its events.

The new system features six levels with Level One solely comprising the season finale of the Badminton World Tour and $1.5 million available for the taking. Level Two consists of three $1 million events, while the prize money available for Levels Three through Five ranges from $700,000 down to $150,000. Level Six will only contain Open Events which National Federations can apply to sanction.

In total, 37 events will be a part of the new structure announced following the BWF Council meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

"Our tournaments have grown in stature and appeal significantly in recent years and, with each cycle, we evaluate progress and assess how we can improve our events," said BWF president Poul-Erik Høyer.

"We have determined the time is right for badminton to soar even higher and our key goals are to showcase our sport at a high level of presentation and competitiveness, to increase television coverage for the sport and to increase the star quality and popularity of the top players globally through increased television coverage."

The new tournament structure will remain in place through the 2021 season.

Major Rule Changes Announced for United World Wrestling

United World Wrestling (UWW) presidentNenad Lalovic released a memorandum on March 17 describing the various rule changes voted on by the federation's bureau.

The changes were initially discussed during the UWW Technical Commission meeting in January.

The number of weight categories per style will increase from 8 to 10 at the start of 2018.

The UWW bureau will vote on new weight categories for Senior, U-23 and Junior wrestling during their meeting at the 2017 World Championships in Paris.

The federation will also begin a two-day competition format. The new system will be put to the test during the Cadet European Championships in July and Cadet World Championships in September of 2017. If successful, the new system will also be officially implemented Jan. 1, 2018.

The two-day format requires wrestlers to maintain their weight for both days. Previously athletes would weigh in the day before they compete and finish the competition in one day.

Apart from the two-day format, the bureau has also decided to make adjustments to the ranking system which is now a year long.

Among some of the other minor changes are updates to the Greco-Roman wrestling rules effective March 28, 2018 at the Under-23 European Championships and having four top seeded athletes during the 2017 Senior World Championships in Paris.

Updates on anti-doping were also released. Beginning in 2018 if one athlete is found guilty of doping, their entire team will be eliminated.

Awarding 2024, 2028 Olympics Simultaneously 'Great for Judo'

International Judo Federation president Marius Vizer says awarding two Olympics at a time would benefit his sport and the Olympic Movement.

"For judo it could be great and I think would it make things easier for the next bid strategy," Vizer tells Around the Rings during a live Q-and-A session on Twitter.

The International Olympic Committee is strongly considering awarding both the 2024 and 2028 Summer Olympics at its IOC Session this September in Lima, Peru as a result of another trying bidding process for the Olympic leaders.

Los Angeles and Paris are the only two cities remaining in the 2024 bid race following the withdrawals of Budapest, Rome and Hamburg at various stages in the process. The 2024 race is following the same, sorry path of the 2022 Winter Olympics that saw a field of six candidate cities diminish to two by the final vote.

Although awarding two Games at once is gaining support from IOC and International Federations leaders alike, Los Angeles and Paris bid leaders are adamant they are only vying for the 2024 Games at this time.

"We're OK if the IOC wants to give two Games at the same session in Lima," said Paris 2024 bid leader Tony Estanguet. "But on our side, our project is only possible for '24. We also believe this is the time to come back to Paris, or to Europe, in '24."

"It might be a responsible thing for the Olympics to do," Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said. "We’re solely focused on 2024, and I’d hate to see the United States not bid again in the future, because you know three times burned – assuming that the cards are stacked against us," he said, alluding to bidding failures for the 2012 and 2016 Games.

The IOC will elect the 2024 host city on Sep. 13 before deciding if it will offer the second place finisher the option to host the 2028 Games.

Click here to read more about Vizer's Q-and-A on Twitter.

Written by Kevin NutleyandCourtney Colquitt

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