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Rio Olympics 2016 – Modern Pentathlon – Final – Women’s Fencing Prize Round – Deodoro Stadium – Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – 8/19/2016 Britain’s Kate French (GBR) competes. REUTERS / Edgard Garrido
TORONTO, June 27 (Reuters) – It’s called the modern pentathlon, but it’s an old guard who looks ready to leave in the glory of the Tokyo Olympics and bring a new era of live television to sports. going through the 2024 Paris Games.
Based on the skills of an ideal soldier, modern pentathlon is the only sport created specifically for the modern Olympics when it was introduced by Baron Pierre de Coubertin in Stockholm in 1912 and has remained relatively unchanged ever since.
Originally, five events in the modern pentathlon; pistol shooting, epee-fencing, freestyle swimming, show jumping and cross-country skiing were fought over four days. At the 1996 Atlanta Games, the current one-day format was adopted, and in 2000, women were added to the program.
But in 2024, there will be tectonic changes that will see the whole race packed into a 90-minute window in an effort to make it more audience-friendly.
With the number of spectators at or near the end of all Olympic events, the place of the modern pentathlon in the game program is questioned.
Leaders of the sport have heard the rumble and worked to come up with what it describes as a faster, more connected, and smaller form.
“A new era for our Olympic sports begins in the birthplace of the founder, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, in 2024,” greeted Dr. Klaus Schormann, President of the International Federation of Modern Pentathletes (UIPM) after the International Olympic Committee (IOC). adopted the new format in early June.
Not everyone is impressed with the modernization of the modern pentathlon.
British Kate French, a gold medalist in Tokyo, told Eurosport that she was unsure about continuing the sport because of the changes.
“Modern pentathlon isn’t the most watched or popular, but I think there are other ways we could market the current product better,” the Frenchman said. “I love sports as such.”
While the sport takes on a new look, it is the old faces that lead the way to Tokyo.
Hungarian Adam Marosi, the 2009 world champion, fired back into the Olympic medal picture when in June, the 36-year-old turned the clock backwards to win his second world championship 12 years after the first.
Australian Chloe Esposito is not in Tokyo to defend his Rio title after the birth of a child, but 32-year-old silver medalist Elodie Clouvel of France has returned. Lithuanian Laura Asadauskaite, winner of the 2012 London Games, wants to end her career with a golden note at the age of 37.
Anastasiya Prokopenko, who awaited a decade bronze medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics after Ukraine’s rejection of doping by Viktoriya Tereshchuk, is looking for a clearer result from Tokyo, where the 35-year-old reigning world champion is a top medal challenger.
Reported by Steve Keating in Toronto, editor: Pritha Sarkar
Our standards: Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
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