Nearly two years after ignoring it for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) added the mixed team archery competition at the sports program on Wednesday.
With archery, mixed team events were also added to table tennis, golf, gymnastics, rowing coastal beach sprint and athletics, which would have a mixed relay in addition to 4 × 400.
The number of teams in women and men’s football tournaments will also be swapped. There will be 16 teams in women’s competition in LA sports and men will have 12.
This – and for many other programs – the first means in Olympic history, 36 sports will have more female athlete quota spots (5,655) than the male athlete quota spot (5,543).
However, the inclusion of the compound will come in the form of music in the ears of Indian archers.
For more than a decade, archery has been playing a game that has promised a lot, but has given very little to India on the Olympic stage. While with uncontrolled dominance of South Korea, repetition archers acted under pressure, India has emerged as a proper compound force over the last three years.
Compound archery invented in USA in the 1960s was first included in the World Archery Championship in 1995. It is a style of archery that uses a bow with more mechanical components such as cam and puli, making boostering easier and more consistent.
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The compound archers have often won medals in the World Cup and World Championships. At Hangzo Asian Games, India had a clean broom of gold medals in compound archery, leading Jyothi Surekha Venam March. For a person like Venam who has won all this till now, the La Olympic medal will now be the final goal.
According to the latest mixed team rankings, India ranks second from the United States, winning medals in three of the four events considered for the ranking points in 2024. It is different from half a dozen other medals won in the programs of the team mixed in the world and continental programs.
In a statement, Professor, President of World Archery, Dr. Ugur Erdner said: “This is a monumental step for the game and for millions of compound archers around the world who have long sought Olympic recognition.”
The Federation said in a statement, “This is the first time after the reconstruction of archery for the Olympic Games in 1972 that a new bostal has been added to the competition.”
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Meanwhile, the shooting also led to the format change, the government body announced that the shooters would be seen competing in the final only in the final in the finals in the 50m Rifle 3P final at the Los Angeles Olympics. In the earlier format, the shooters had to shoot in three stages – standing, kneeling and prone – this is a difficult technical phenomenon.
© The Indian Express Private Limited
