Olympic Wrestling is Back

09 Sep, 2013

Wrestling completed an unprecedented comeback on Sunday, reclaiming its spot in the 2020 Olympic Games after beating bids from rivals squash and baseball/softball in an International Olympic Committee vote.

An iconic Olympic sport, wrestling featured in the ancient Olympics as well as every modern Games apart from 1900. Yet it surprisingly lost its Olympic spot in February as the IOC looked to refresh its programme.

It is the first sport to earn back its Olympic place immediately, with all other returning events taking years or decades to make a comeback.

“Normally this is done in a few years, we did it in a few months. It was a question of our survival,” a delighted international wrestling federation (FILA) president Nenad Lalovic told reporters.

As the latest Games entrant, wrestling is the only sport to be guaranteed a spot until the 2024 Olympics, with the 27 others up for review in 2017. “We did all we could, we changed our sport and the federation was successful. We continue to work tomorrow.”

Lalovic had said in his presentation to the IOC prior to the vote that “today is the most important day in the 3000-year history of our sport”.

The Serbian had taken over in February after their Olympic exit and had been credited with bringing the sport back into contention after it made a shortlist of candidate sports in May.

“With this vote, you (the IOC) have shown that the steps we have taken to improve our sport have made a difference,” he said adding more changes were in store for the sport, including the entry of athletes and positions of officials.

“I assure each of you that our modernisation will not stop now. We will continue to strive to be the best partner to the Olympic Movement that we can be,” he said.

The IOC had said at the time, wrestling had failed to modernise, becoming complacent over decades amid waning interest.

“It was clear the IOC Executive Board made a mistake by getting rid of it,” IOC member Richard Pound told Reuters Television. “Today we corrected that mistake.”

Reuters

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