(ANSA) - ROME, JUL 19 - A 'special' edition also due to covid, but four sports debut.
With an eye definitely turned to the young audience.
The Tokyo Games, which will open on 23 July, will also be those of the five-circle baptism of climbing, karate, skateboarding and surfing: there will be a total of 33 sports, for a total of 50 disciplines divided into 339 events at which more than 200 nations will participate, with Italy having to defend the 28 medals won in Rio five years ago.
Apart from the absolute novelties, the Japanese Olympics will also welcome the return of baseball and softball (Italy is present only with the women's team, while among the men the absence of the Cuban champions causes a sensation), which after Beijing 2008 were excluded from the two subsequent editions. Among the new disciplines under basketball, the first 3 vs 3 basketball tournament will enter and will see the blue players on the parquet.
Beginning sports, however, wink at generation z: surfing will certainly have the island of Enoshima as its natural venue (it will also host sailing): a small island of 4 km, with crystal clear sea, considered a surfer's paradise Japanese and which attracted - in pre-Covid times - thousands of tourists. Absolute premiere for skateboarding too: flying boards - after snowboarding at the Winter Games - will also spin in Japan to the delight of growing enthusiasts all over the world. For Italy there will be Ivan Federico from Turin and Alessandro Mazzara from Rome, who won the pass in the last stage of season 2 of the Dew Tour.Among the most practiced martial arts in the world but never included in the Olympic program in Tokyo there will be karate (short passage because in Paris 2024 it will be removed from the program) with five blues ready to do battle: Viviana Bottaro, Luigi Busà, Mattia Busato, Silvia Semeraro and Angelo Crescenzo, the latter world champion in 2018 and European vice-champion in 2019, with high ambitions. Spotlights also on the climbing walls, which will see three Italians competing: Ludovico Fossali, Michael Piccolruaz and Laura Rogora.Ludovico Fossali, Michael Piccolruaz and Laura Rogora.Ludovico Fossali, Michael Piccolruaz and Laura Rogora.
Sports that children like and with which the IOC wants to make the Olympics more and more trendy and set in the contexts of modern metropolises. It is no coincidence that in Paris in three years breakdance will debut, the street dance born in the American suburbs and become a cult. The Games of novelties, with shows and audiences in their sights. (HANDLE).