Three months after it surprisingly was removed from the list of core Olympic sports, wrestling will get another shot.
The International Olympic Committee’s executive board shortlisted three sports Wednesday for inclusion beginning with the 2020 Summer Games.
Also competing for the single opening is baseball/softball and squash. A final decision will be made in September after a full membership vote.
Karate, roller sports, sport climbing, wakeboarding and the Chinese martial art of wushu were eliminated. Franco Carraro, who chairs the Olympic program commission, said in a news conference he hoped the process had been “useful” for the five sports not selected.
“We understand they are not happy,” he said.
For wrestling, there was reason to celebrate. “While our place in the Olympic Games is still not guaranteed, this decision recognizes the great lengths to which we are going to reform our sport and address the IOC’s concerns,” said Nenad Lalovic, the president of wrestling’s governing body (FILA).
Clearly the IOC’s executive board, which met in St. Petersburg, Russia, was impressed with wrestling’s progress. Wrestling responded to the initial takedown with a relentless social media campaign and significant change.
The international governing body (FILA) elected a new president, included more women in decision-making roles, added two more women’s weight classes and adopted rule changes to make the sport easier to understand.
Its makeover also may include a few tricks borrowed from the MMA world (no more singlets, addition of music, lighting, visual effects) to make the sport more entertaining. Also, the USA, Iran and Russia formed an alliance to restore the sport, an impressive show of unity.
“The executive board received excellent presentations (Wednesday) from eight international federations,” IOC president Jacques Rogge said in a statement. “It was never going to be an easy decision, but I feel my colleagues on the board made a good decision in selecting baseball/softball, squash and wrestling to be put forward in Buenos Aires.”
Wrestling’s inclusion puts squash and baseball/softball in danger of being left out once again. With golf and rugby being added for 2016, there only is one spot remaining on the 28-sport Olympic program.
Still, for squash, which was expected to be shortlisted, there was reason to celebrate. “I said to the executive board that the one big regret in my career is that I have never had the chance to compete in the Olympic Games, but I would happily trade all my seven world titles for the chance of Olympic gold,” said Malaysia’s Nicol David, the No. 1 ranked player who helped present the bid. “Hopefully that showed what competing in the Games means to me.”
The inclusion of baseball and softball was somewhat of a surprise, given karate was expected to vie for third place. The formation of a single sporting federation was expected to improve the bid’s chances. The federation also pitched ways to shorten the competition. It also helped that a heavyweight – Antonio Castro, the son of the former Cuban leader and a vice president of the World Baseball Softball Confederation – delivered the federation’s presentation.
Though wrestling was expected to get a green light, Lalovic didn’t think the go-ahead was a given.
“It’s never inevitable,” he told USA TODAY Sports before the vote. “We have seven competitors. They’ve had two or three years to prepare themselves. We’ve had two or three months. We have to do in three months what they’ve done in three years. It’s more difficult to change an existing way of behavior than to adopt a new one. We have to change. We have to fix all this in order to come in front of this. We did this. Maybe they will accept.”
In February, the IOC board decided to cut wrestling from a list of core sports. Former U.S. Olympic Committee chief executive officer Jim Scherr was part of Wednesday’s presentation in St. Petersburg along with wrestlers Lise Legrand of France and Canadians Daniel Igali and Carol Huynh.