No Changes in Core Olympic Sports for Paris 2024

(ATR) The International Olympic Committee approves the core sports program for Paris 2024, keeping the latest additions of golf and rugby that made their debut at Rio 2016.

IOC sports program commission chairman Franco Carraro outlined the proposal to the Session in Lima, Peru, seeking no changes to the sports program following what he deemed "really successful" games in Rio de Janeiro last year.

While all 28 sports contested in Rio will be on the program for Tokyo 2020 and Paris 2024, there is the stipulation that each International Federation must comply 100 percent with the Olympic Charter.

This is of particular concern for the International Weightlifting Federation which has had a large number of doping positives from retests of athlete samples from Beijing 2008 and London 2012. Carraro singled out the sport and noted a decision about weightlifting’s inclusion in Paris 2024 could take place in December 2017.

"In any case there will be speeches between the IOC Executive Board and the IWF because we cannot ignore the problem of the percentage of the positive cases in this sport, which frankly are quite embarrassing," Carraro said.

Weightlifting has already been confirmed as a sport for Tokyo 2020, but IOC vice president John Coates noted that the athlete quota for the sport has been significantly reduced to reflect its doping issues. The IOC will continue to monitor the federation’s progress as well as the National Federations of weightlifting which have also shown difficulties in doping prevention.

"The IF must satisfy the EB by the end of this year to address the serious incidents of doping in the sport and ensure integrity within its administration," Coates told the Session. "We’ve also noted as well as a high incidence of ADRVs (Anti-Doping Rule Violation) in international level athletes, there are some countries with a very high level of national level athletes with ADRVs and we want to ensure steps are taken in those countries, and if not a there will be a reduction in their ability to participate in the Games."

The approved program for Paris 2024 does not include the five additional sports Paris 2024 may submit for inclusion in the Games. Carraro outlined the process for Paris 2024 to submit additional sports, adding that the process is the same as that in Tokyo 2020 where five sports were added to the core program of 28 sports.

"The OCOG has the right to make a proposal concerning additional events and other sports, and on this point after the proposal of Paris, the Session will take a decision eventually in 2019," Carraro said, adding that a final approval will be made in December 2020 so the IOC may take into consideration the first implementation of additional events at Tokyo 2020.

A decision on the core sports program for Los Angeles 2028 has been pushed to 2021 despite the city’s election as a host city at this Session.

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Written by Kevin Nutley

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