Games strike gender balance
THE Summer Olympics will grow by 15 events in 2020, the International Olympic Committee announced yesterday, adding 3-on-3 basketball and six events that will involve men and women competing on mixed teams.
The committee added mixedgender relays in swimming, track and triathlon; mixed team events in archery and judo; and mixed doubles in table tennis.
The new events come in addition to five sports that were added for 2020 last year: karate, skateboarding, sport climbing, surfing and baseball/softball, which are counted as a single sport by the IOC.
‘‘The fascinating new events that we approved today, together with the five new sports that were added to the Tokyo 2020 programme last year, represent a step-change in the Olympic programme,’’ committee president Thomas Bach said.
‘‘I am delighted that the Olympic Games in Tokyo will be more youthful, more urban and will include more women.’’
In years past, women and men seldom competed together at the Olympics. When tennis was brought back in 1988, for example, men’s and women’s doubles was included but not mixed doubles.
But mixed events have found favour in international sports and with the IOC in recent years. Mixed-doubles badminton was added for the 1996 Games, and for tennis in 2012.
Mixed relays are a new development. Swimming added a mixed relay to its world championships in 2015, and it brought intriguing strategic decisions, like whether to start with the slower women or to try to build a big lead with the men.
‘‘I think it’s so fun,’’ the American Missy Franklin said. ‘‘Honestly, I think it’s a big testament to swimming for combining men and women competing together. I think that that’s so cool to have that opportunity.’’
Also yesterday, men’s events were dropped in favour of women’s events in boxing, canoeing and rowing, to bring the games closer to a stated goal of full gender equity. Kit McConnell, IOC sports director, said that 48.8 percent of athletes would be women, up from 46.1 percent in Rio de Janeiro in 2016.