I had always kind of wondered if this day would come, and it looks like it is finally dawning upon us all. That’s right folks, skateboarding is being considered for the 2012 Olympic Games. Spurred on by the success (success being a relative term of course) the IOC is considering the proposal right now, which would allow our favorite 4 wheel warriors to finally win those real gold medals instead of the cheesy X-shaped ones that they win at the X Games every year. What will the track and field athletes think? Read more after the jump.
Skateboarding Considered for the 2012 Olympics
From ESPN: Youth movement? Olympics may add skateboarding for 2012
Skateboarding events are part of the X Games, and the IOC is eager to modernize the Olympic program with sports and disciplines that appeal to youth. It has already added snowboarding to the Winter Games and BMX cycling for next year’s Beijing Olympics.
“The IOC wants to make the program relevant for young people,” IOC spokeswoman Emmanuelle Moreau said
From the Irish Examiner: Skateboarding ‘may debut’ at 2012 Olympics
In order for skateboarding to be held at the Games, the International Cycling Union would need to formally recognise skateboarding as a sport and come up with a formal proposal to be considered by the IOC, she said.
From This Is London: Skateboarding to make Olympic debut in 2012
London Games organisers have already earmarked the cycling velodrome in the Olympic Park as a venue for the inaugural Olympic skateboarding event.
The competition would take place in the middle of the cycle circuit where organisers plan to erect several “half-pipes” on which skateboarders perform their stunts.
A unique perspective from Cycling News: UCI to add skateboarding to Olympic menu? (Scroll Down)
It remains to be seen of the addition of skateboarding would result in any further cuts of cycling events. Track cycling lost the men’s and women’s kilometre and 500m time trial events to accommodate the addition of BMX racing.
From Times Online: Skateboarding ramps up its bid to be an Olympic sport
By becoming a discipline of an existing sport, skateboarding would be able to sidestep the usual seven-year wait for Olympic entry. This would also give the executive board of the IOC final say on entry, which usually requires a two-thirds majority of IOC members. In 2005 the IOC considered squash and karate for inclusion, but each sport failed to gain the necessary majority to join the Games in 2012.
From Earth Times: Skateboarding may join the Olympics
IOC President Jacques Rogge wants skateboarding to be part of the 2012 Games after snowboarding at the Winter Games in Turin was such a success. He also said it is likely the sport would have a positive impact on television ratings among young people.
29 comments
Conahan
Yeah, on perpendicular intersecting courses with live ammo.
orezona
they should try to do a BMX event at the same time as a skate event…
brianb
So if skating will be under cyclng discipline couldn’t that start to open the floodgates for the arguement to have BMX allowed at all skateparks? I’ve got no problem with most of the bike heads at the parks that allow it here in UT but I can see where that could be a valid agrument potentially getting brought up in city meetings. just saying
nweyesk8
the olympics makes sense as the next step in skateboardings evolution. When I started ‘street’ skating clothes were extremely large and oversized, the rest of the fashion worlkd soon followed. Now, I see skaters wearing ‘female’ pants and other forms of really tight clothing. Isn’t it obvious that the next step in skateboarding is skin tight athletic wear ‘spandex’ with all body hair removed for improved aerodynamics.
Kilwag
kinda like iraq. i do watch it. some good things happen. but in overall it is fucking wrong.
Ha! Best line in the thread. I was going to have to kick you off the team until I read that.
Skateboarding in the Olympics is kind of like Iraq.
ssk
Hopefully the International Cycling Union will make them wear bike helmets and spandex. That will be kick ass!
concretin
Totally cool, Marek. Wasn’t taking any offense to your opinions of my views, nor was I trying to shovel any offense. This is what I love about skating, SkateandAnnoy, and OMA… it’s all about the skating… See ya at the parks, well, someday I’ll make to the NW…
marek
im sorry. to ME any team is bullshit. to ME olympics are bullshit. YOUR arguments are valid to you and i can agree with some of them (they are skaters and i have nothing against people getting paid). lets drop it and go skate. i went yesterday and bust my forehead at burnside. fun… shoulda stayed with my sleeping baby and wife.
however i cant resist to respond to one more thing. i dont judge people for entering any contests but i do judge contests themselfes. some of them sucks and we as a skaters would be better without them. olympics are one of them. in MY opinion.
concretin
Exactly. I KNOW competitions are crazy hard to judge, even if the format is what the skaters like/want. I have no doubt the Olympic format will be whacked, especially the first year. But I don’t care about that. I will watch and the volume of my shouts of enthusiasm will be exactly the same if Tony, or Bob wins… but I’ll be able to sing Tony’s national anthem… I’ll be just as proud to cheer Bob, PLG, Rune (pick anyone) because they’re SKATERS!!
280 mil talent pool… Isn’t that GREAT!? Seriously! To have that many possible athletes? And the “team” won’t be just “picked” by random out of the hat drawing. They’ll have to make the cut just like other “sports.” If ya can’t do that rodeo flip in the heat of competition, you ain’t gonna make it. But that doesn’t mean a session with you is any less kick ass! I’m sorry, stupid and gullible as I am, (I guess I’ve been called worse) to win an Olympic medal has a certain prestige to it. Not just anyone can do that. Same thing with an X-Games medal really. But the Olympics is an international stage that has been and will be around for generations. Is Shaun White the best snowboarder ever? No. But that year, that day, on that international stage, amongst his peers… hell yea he was. And I’d bet that medal means more to him than the X-Games medals.
Are Bucky, Bob, Andy, Rune, etc. etc. any less of a skater for competing in the X-Games/DewTour/PoolParty etc. etc. etc. They didn’t start skating for the money, nor the medals. They don’t continue to do it because of that… They do it because they enjoy it! And if ya can get paid to skate, who wouldn’t? They are all part of “teams.” Sponsorship teams. I just don’t understand how a team representing your country can be worse.
marek
randy,i am student of the olympics. that why i know its such a bullshit (for too many reasons which got nothing to do with skateboarding). you obviously arent so you can say such a nonsense about chinese not winning anything. first three countries in numbers of medals are usually U.S.,russia and china. i know you meant why arent chinese winning at skatebording. maybe because they dont skate that much? (maybe at all -yeah i know about shanghai park, but it is empty, kinda like pier:) )? which team is gonna win olympics in skating really dosnt matter to me. my first post was more of a joke and second was an answer to too proud american celebrating victory of his team at winter olympics and hoping for the same thing happening in london. i dont give shit but i can still react to such a statement,cant i?
i can perfectly see your (and conretins) point of making skateboarding more popular and acceptable (same argument is used for X-gaymess) plus i would add monetary gain for few winning guys. that is all very cool and positive but those are things i gonna say about :who gives a crap.
rooting for individual styles and lines?of course – makes sense. however you might have to also see four korean skaters plus some dudes from kurdistan. cool and possibly entertaining but i dont give crap. skate contest in general are quite problematic issue but i like them because sometimes most amazing things happens when there is right format of contest (trifecta and other jam formats contests). none of that is gonna happen at TV viewrs demographic oriented olympics. even the head of IOC says that he hopes for better tv rating but doesnt mention anything about any positive aspects of skateborading itself.
however i feel like a i have to admit i definitely gonna watch it on tv if it happens but theres no argument which would persuade me to tell that is a good thing. kinda like iraq. i do watch it. some good things happen. but in overall it is fucking wrong.
Kilwag
I had no idea you were such a student of the Olympics. Come on, fair? Who cares. It’s the best talent from one country against the best talent from another- kind of the whole point of the Olympics. There are other sports forums (especially in skateboarding) where you don’t have to compete as teams. for Population base isn’t a factor. If it were, then the Chinese would win everything.
I have to agree with Concretin, the biggest thing this means is more skateparks around the world, and that’s a good thing. As for the actual competition in the Olympics… Who cares. Brazillians will probably win anyway. If I watch it at all, I will likely root for whatever skater’s style and personality I like the best, regardless of country of origin.
marek
man, my point was that if any skate contest should display real true talent then we would have to have 15 americans out of thirty half pipe dudes. thats not gonna happen. and if they would include street into it then we all know that theres totally different level of street skaters who almost never attend any contest. but again there could be only four U.S. guys skating. format of olympics is so stupid that it defies all logic and its wide acceptance by general public proves general publics (and im afraid that in this case even yours “concretin”) stupidity and gullibility.
and again. how can you root for team picked out of 280 mils talent pool competing against teams (fuck, i hate that word) from much smaller countries. fair play your stupid ass.
concretin
More coverage in a positive light equals more skateparks. More skateparks equals more fun for ME. And that is what(who) is important to ME. And I’d love to see the US sweep the podium in skating, just like snowboarding… though those damn Brazilians might give us some problems… assuming they pass the aforementioned drug tests…
orezona
everybody knows skateboarding will be dead again by 2012 anyways…
andbro
As far asnowboarding goes we have already been through this with our governing bodies, all 3 of them 2 of which are actually ski organizations. something worked well others not so good in the addition of snowboarding to the olympics.
the good things were that these organizations who really just wanted apiece to cash in on in most cases were forced to recognize the wishes of the athletes as far as qualifying events and rules all be it with some compromizes along the way.
so far with 3 olympics under snowboardings belt it has progressively gotten better with the best riders getting to go regardless of “team” affilation. I work in the competitive snowboard world and I have very mixed feelings about the whole skateboarding in the olympics thing. these things have away of being a mixed blessing.
adam
the comeback of vert skateboarding?
Kilwag
Marek, I see sleep deprivation is already affecting you.
marek
hey mark, i know you are just kidding eversince you took slalom and freestyle into consideration. thank god it is not your organizing body which takes care of olympics:) however – FUCK OLYMPICS – whole idea of olymics is bullshit because of the whole format. only four (maybe more?) members teams (sic) from each nation can compete. what a crap. everybody knows that czech republic have more than four world class skaters!!! not to mention that your team is gonna be picked out of 281,421,906 people (April 1, 2000) and our nation have only around 10 mils. FUCK THAT. and how about drug tests??? id wanna see that… burnquist with his wife on the front page of high times…
sid
there is no “real” vert skateboarding in Oregon except pier park.
houseofneil
mc, I think street would be the most popular: about 90% of skaters skate street. vert is still a minority pastime. At least in every other state apart from Oregon. . . .
cowboy
street skating is in the mainstream becuase any kid can walk down the street with a skateboard and call himself a street skater. Therefore its more closely related to marketing not skill. Im sure more people can do a kick flip over a fun box than they can do a kick flip 15 feet in the air and come back in to a 12′ wall. Bowl skating should be the event then it incorporates both worlds.
JF
It’s so funny to me that when you see skating on TV (big event) they always showcase vert, yet vert riding is so tiny compare to street skating these days. Open TW or Trasher and let me know if you see 1 page of vert riding or even a glimps of Tony Hawk…..nope. So strange.
Kilwag
Checkin gout some of the cycling sites the news is coming up on, your average cycler is already pissed about adding BMX because it means less events for “serious” cycling races. Now they think they may have to give up more cycling events because of skateboarding being called a bicycling discipline. Too funny. Let’s all rally to the cause of serious cycling enthusiasts by egging them on. Keep skateboarding out of the Olympics!
Here’s a quote: The UCI cans the kilo and the 500 at the olympics, and then wants to take part isn’t introducing skateboarding! What are the asshats at UCI thinking. Do they really give a crap about cycling? I just don’t get it.
Kilwag
Why doesn’t Snowboarding’s governing body recognize Skateboarding? Oh the irony…
Mac
In order for the IOC to even consider a sport for inclusion in the Olympics, there needs to be a recognized international governing body for the sport, or an already recognized IGB needs to “sponsor” the nominated sport. This is why UCI would have to “recognize” skateboarding, the way that FIS (skiing) “adopted” snowboarding before Nagano. This would be pretty weird with skating and cycling, as there’s no obvious relationship here the way that there sort of is with skiing and snowboarding. I wonder what the hell the UCI would do with skating? Slalom? They’re wreaking havoc with BMX right now for Beijing by messing with the format, going to more of a tv-friendly supercross, downhill start, 1 lap format. Anyway, I’m an Olympics fan in general, but not sure I want to see skating in there. Far too regulated, and we don’t need more “judged” sports in the Games. Sorry for the novel…
Coulter
Don’t get me wrong. I am not a big fan of skateboarding in the Olympics. The Rings of Joy was sarcasm, but sometimes my sarcasm does work out so well. Yeah, the fact that the cycling body is considering this and making the decision should tell you where this is headed. As for the masses of people who watch skateboarding on TV out there (like my Dad) I think that all they know is vert skating. I am sure that they have no idea that street skating exists or that there are such things as street contests. Thanks for the edit Kilwag.
mc
Slalom or freestyle has to be less popular than vert skating. As far as I can tell vert skating is the most popular form of skating. Every time I ask myself what kind of skating I want to do today I get the same answer. This organizing body does not recognize any other opinions.
baldy
ESPN story quote… “Emanulle Goes to the Olympics” is one of my favorite mature movies
Kilwag
Beat me to it! Thanks though, I’ve got a bunch of links about it, fancy graphics planned with pools fiilling in the rings, etc.. glad I don’t have to do that now.
Rings of joy? I don’t know about that, I’d rather it wasn’t in the olympics, but I guess the joy is that it will likely cause more money to be spent on skateparks. The ironic thing is, it will likely be vert skating in the olympics, the least popular form of skating. Come to think of it, Vert skating on TV has a lot to do with making skateboarding popular for groms. Video games too…
I’m going to edit your post (I did already, more to come) to include a few links to some other stories. One that says that for some reason a cycling organization has to recognize skateboarding as a sport for it to happen. (????!?)