Five New Sports for Tokyo?

(ATR) Tokyo 2020 gets set to recommend new sports for the Olympic program.

Japanese media speculate that up to five additional sports will be proposed when a committee delivers a much-anticipated report Monday in Tokyo.

Baseball/softball, surfing, skateboarding, sport climbing and karate are said to be on the list in the report to come from the Additional Event Program Panel.

The committee of Japanese experts has evaluated 26 sports which applied for the program in 2020, last month selecting eight sports for final consideration. Those on the shortlist included baseball/softball, bowling, karate, roller sports, sport climbing, squash, surfing and wushu.

The search for new Olympic sports is another element of the Olympic Agenda 2020 reforms of IOC president Thomas Bach adopted last December. The IOC has eliminated the limit of 28 sports on the Olympic program in favor of a more flexible approach that allows an organizing committee to select events which are popular in the host country.

The recommendations of the additional sports committee will need to be approved by the IOC Executive Board as well as at the IOC Session next August in Rio de Janeiro.

If indeed five new sports are proposed by the committee, the addition would be the biggest ever for an Olympic Games of the recent era. The additions however would not necessarily be permanent as future Olympic cities will have a similar option to name events beyond the 28 core sports on the program.

In order to recommend a sport for the IOC to approve, Tokyo 2020 organizers must also present a business plan that indicates how the sport can be included without compromising housing, transportation orother logistics that come with an Olympic Games.

In the case of housing, Tokyo 2020 is constructing apartment blocks for the Olympic Village that will only be partially filled with the competitors from the 28 existing sports on the program. As a result, there is room for expansion needed to accommodate several hundred more athletes without needing to build bigger.

Baseball/softball has always been expected as the favorite to be added to the Tokyo program given the popularity of both disciplines in Japan. The two sports will also provide thebiggest jolt to the logistics for Tokyo with hundreds of additional athletes and officials compared to the few dozen proposed for other sports.

Youth appeal as well as engaging Japan and worldwide audiences are supposed to be among the criteria used by the panel in making its final recommendation.

From the list mentioned by the Japanese media, skateboarding, surfing and sport climbing may score points in particular with young people. Baseball and softball would bring a worldwide following to the Games besides their appeal in Japan. And karate is a sport which was born on the Japanese island of Okinawa.

The seven-member panel is led by Fujio Mitarai, honorary chairman of the influential Japan Business Federation known as Keidanren. The group includes Tokyo 2020 sports director Koji Murofushi as one of the observers.

The group has met a number of times this year leading up to the final session Monday in Tokyo. The announcement is scheduled for the afternoon at the Tokyo 2020 headquarters.

Written by Ed Hula.