(ATR) International Roller Sports Federation chiefs tell Around the Rings that FIRS is making significant revisions to its 2020 Olympic bid to increase the sport’s appeal to the IOC.
The marathon road race included in an earlier proposal has been replaced with a 300m indoor time trial, and federation chiefs are now asking the IOC for 60 more roller sports athletes to take part in the Olympics.
This means the roller sports proposal will include no road action at all. The five track events also include 500m, 1km, 10km and 15km races.
Roller sports secretary general Roberto Marotta told ATR the bid changes showed his federation was fighting hard to become an Olympic sport after missing out on inclusion in the Rio 2016 Games to rugby and golf.
He said the bid revisions followed an IOC evaluation visit at the World Speed Skating Championships in Ascoli Piceno, Italy last month. IOC program commission member Nat Indrapana of Thailand and a member of the IOC’s sports department were part of the inspection team.
"We listened to some suggestions. They were very excited to watch the track events and after that [championships] they sent a letter asking us to modify our request to have a road race," Marotta said.
"So now we are asking for just five track events. We want to identify our sport on the track," he added.
The 300m time trial – 1.5 laps of the track – is a "very fast event and will present a very specialist discipline for the sprinters," he explained.
Another major amendment is the request for a competition featuring 80 men and 80 women – previously, FIRS called for 50 male and 50 female athletes.
Marotta claimed the IOC delegation was also impressed with the spread of medal at the world championships across 18 countries and all continents, proving the universality of roller sports.
FIRS leaders will sit down with the IOC Program Commission on Dec. 18 and 19 to discuss their reworked proposal.
"I am confident that if the IOC decides to have new young sports in the Olympics they have to open the door to our sport," Marotta said."It is very popular with kids all around the world."
Roller sports is competing with six other sports to join the 2020 Olympic program – the others are climbing, karate, squash, wakeboard, wushu and a joint bid by baseball/softball.
Only one sport is expected to be chosen for inclusion in the 2020 Games.
After presentations to the Program Commission in late December, the IOC Executive Board will add another sport to the mix in February when an existing Olympic sport gets cut.
EB members are scheduled to meet again in May on the sidelines of SportAccord in St. Petersburg, Russia to decide which of the eight then gets recommended to the IOC Session in September 2013 for confirmation.
Reported by Mark Bisson
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