Half the sports in the Olymnpics should be scrapped

Air guns? Dressage? Competitive walking? FFS!!!

Does anyone know what the criteria is for inclusion?

I don't see the difference between shooting and darts, except that darts is more popular.

WOuldn't you just love to see this guy representing his country?

It's no more ridiculous than having synchronized swimming as an Olympic sport. Ping pong is actually quite popular in a number of countries...certainly more popular than softball (outside of the US).

Cheers,

Table tennis is as someone stated very popular in Europe and Asia (and not just China,, Korea, Indonesia, Japan and Thailand have great players). It is not as dominated by the Chinese as one mihgt think, German Timo Boll and Swede Jan Owe Waldner were the best in the world for several years,, I think Boll is still playing but not sure.

There are worse "sports" than table tennis though,, the walking and synchronized swimming,, ridiculous and laughable events imo. Dressage too. I didn't even know baseball was an olympic event, I watch as much of the olympics as I can and I have never even seen fotage from that 2008 or before, but I can relate to americans thinking it's wrong to remove it considering the history of baseball in USA. Not a world sport though. Where is karate? I know a couple of people who are practising it and as far as I know its widely popular and wellknown all over the world (more than Judo and taekwondo which are included in the games). Id love to see rugby or underwater rugby (underwater cameras, wow,, some spectator sport)in the Olympics too. Might be hard to squeeze 5-6 rugby games into 3 weeks but I think it is more popular than baseball,, and hell,, everything is more popular than synchronized swimming.

Nobody is going to need to check their passport to know they are over 16. I see your point, perhaps the removal of synchronized swimming is going to need more careful review.

Cheers,

I just skimmed through the IOC charter and can find nothing on either how sports are chosen, or the criteria they are measured against for continuation.

Does anyone else know?
IT must be written down somewhere surely.

By that definition, tossing off ought to be a sanctioned event. Even the kiwis could participate...so long as there were pictures of sheep on the walls.

But seriously...I think the idea of team sports being punted is a good one.

Cheers,

Life Saving is also a recognized "sport" by the IOC

http://www.olympic.org/uk/sports/recognized/index_uk.asp

Although this would be pretty dramatic to watch, I'd hate to be the "ball" in Life Saving ...

i wonder how many Olympic volunteers would want the job of drowning victim for that event ...

And lets be honest, the great majority of judges are probably female or homosexual. I am just saying. Now, I have nothing against homosexuals (I am not here to judge, after all) but my opinion of what looks good and a homo's might be completely different. And I have no clue about women.

Do you ever see Chinese kids play 75% of the sports in which China has won medals?

I'm not sure if you made a grammatical error or what, but there are a lot more Americans interested by their own choice in Olympic sports than there are Chinese.

Yes...that is exactly what he meant

Especially with gymnastics and diving - if the govt here believes there is potential within a certain kid, they'll take him/her away and train them for future Olympics - but hey...at least they ask for the parents' permission...that counts for something

All the professional Chinese athletes (including two 2008 Olympians and one who was on the 1984 Olympic team) I know are not gymnasts.

Also, in addition to the "eek foreigner" boundary, I'm also an adult and staff, so the few gymnasts who eat in the same cafeteria I do are unlikely to come over and talk to me.

The athletes that I am friends with chose to go into sports. In one man's case his family saved up quite a lot of money to send their unusually large and strong son to a local county-level sports academy in the dream that he might one day be a high school gym teacher. From there he went to the provincial sports academy and eventually the right sport (ie - one in which he could win stuff for China) was found for him before he got too old.

Another way up is for a teacher to notice that a kid is unusually strong or unusually flexible for their age and suggest that they go to a sports academy.

My coworker who used to do the long jump was found by a coach that liked to check out the kids playing games of basketball.

There's a lot of negative sh*t done, but I'd hardly say that they are 1970s style stealing the kids away from their parents and forcing them to train.

-M