Lausanne (AFP)

Breakdance will take its first steps in the Olympic arena at the Paris Games in 2024, the main novelty of a less generous program than in Tokyo but modernized and equal, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) ruled on Monday.

A key step in the preparation of the Paris Olympics, the IOC Executive Board has approved a menu intended to "reduce the cost and complexity associated with hosting the Games", according to its boss Thomas Bach.

The number of athletes goes from 11,092 in Tokyo to 10,500 in Paris, and the podiums from 339 to 329, while reaching for the first time a strict parity and eyeing towards "the youth", summarized the German leader.

Among the sacrificed: the 50 km walk for men, on the Olympic program since 1932. This race, emblematic of its complex gestures and its shortcomings, like that of the French Yohann Diniz at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, will be replaced by "a mixed event to be defined ", according to the IOC.

In a separate statement, the International Athletics Federation announced it was considering "a mixed walking event" and will consult with athletes on this before a decision is made by the end of May 2021 at the latest.

Weightlifting and boxing show the greatest losses in athletes and events, a sign of the Olympic decline of these two historic federations, shaken by governance or doping scandals.

- Art or sport?

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Among the big winners, the four “additional” disciplines added to the 28 summer Olympic sports: in addition to breakdance, the IOC has renewed the climbing, surfing and skateboarding already scheduled in Tokyo.

"There will be a breath of fresh air behind these new sports", rejoiced during a press briefing Jea

n-Philippe Gatien, former silver medalist at the 1992 Olympics and Director of Sports for Paris-2024.

He predicted "a phenomenal success" in breakdance, or "breaking" as it is called by his community of practitioners, branch of hip hop born in the 1970s on the asphalt of the Bronx: first mediated by the cheers of the neighborhood, its games have been the subject of international tournaments for 30 years, including the "Battle of the Year" created in 1991.

On the Olympic road, the decisive impetus came in 2018 from a first appearance at the Buenos Aires Youth Games, which dedicated the Japanese Ramu Kawai and the Russian Sergei Chernishev, alias "Bumblebee", in front of a raging audience.

"Many were worried about seeing the sporting aspect devour the cultural and artistic component," said the 20-year-old "b-boy" at the end of November, quoted by the International Federation of Sports Dance, which has taken the discipline back into its fold.

- Mixed events -

"But everything works in harmony. The endowments have increased, the budgets of the festivals have increased. And in general, the demand for breaking is growing, so the dancers have more business opportunities," he notes.

A future "urban park" welcoming breaking and skateboarding is scheduled on the Place de la Concorde, Paris-2024 recalled in a press release, and will also host "concerts and performances".

Surfing will experience a clear evolution between the two editions: the Japanese have opted for the beach of Tsurigasaki, with well-known rollers, while Paris-2024 has chosen the site of Teahupoo in Tahiti, whose waves are among the most powerful and perilous in the world.

Finally, in traditional disciplines, the number of mixed events will increase from 18 in Tokyo to 22 in Paris, announced the IOC: in addition to the future athletics event, sailing will organize two mixed races in kitesurf and "470", and consider a "mixed ocean race", if the costs are considered reasonable and the safety of the participants guaranteed.

Few new formats were accepted by the IOC, with the exception of two extreme canoe slalom events, when the federations had submitted 41 proposals ranging from sea rowing to cross-country through "parkour" .

© 2020 AFP