TargetTalk

The CEO of Shooting Australia, our peak shooting body for the Olympic disciplines, published his June update recently which contained the following:

"In late June the President and I attended an ISSF Extraordinary General Assembly in Germany. This meeting was called by Member Federations seeking more information and clarity about the removal of three individual male events from the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games program. Unfortunately, it was clear from the outset that the decision to remove these events will not be changed as the International Olympic Committee have already discussed and approved this shift to the 2020 Shooting Program. The conversation then centered around ensuring a decision like this is never again achieved in such a way. As a result, the Meeting agreed to form a committee and to now put in place a much more transparent process to consider the shooting program for the 2024 Olympic Games. This will include considering the re-introduction of the three events that have been removed."

So there is a ray of hope that our beloved Free Pistol may yet be reinstated. There's a long way to go, and there's many a slip twixt cup and lip, etc. etc. but...fingers crossed.

Bob

By 2024 it's unlikely that the ISSF will even get more than advisory input on that.

Traditionally the IOC has approved at a Sports level. A Sport (Shooting/Cycling/Swimming) is in or out and then they have ratified the programme put forward by the relevant Federation. Word is the IOC are looking to become much more involved in the programme at an event-by-event level, not a whole-sport level.

It won't be enough to show that you have gender equality with an equal number of men/women events. They'll be taking a hard look at the likes of Air Pistol and 3P Rifle and complaining that they're not as visual or spectator-friendly as clay shooting or summer biathlon/Target Sprint. Every event will have to "pull it's weight" as far as TV viewership and sponsor interest goes. There will be less room for a Sport to have a couple of TV-friendly events providing "cover" for events that carry enormous merit as sporting events, but stumble as spectator events.


If we break that statement down, everything aside from the last sentence is regarding internal ISSF Processes and Consultation - so there's no impediment to the ISSF forming a token committee to this end. They might be able to form a committee to try and ensure ISSF Policy is made with more transparency and input from National Federations.

But that last sentence is just silly.

BobGee wrote:This will include considering the re-introduction of the three events that have been removed."

He shouldn't be saying stuff like that unless he's got some idea of how to address the fundamental issues of:

1. The IOC says there must be an equal number of Men/Women's events
2. The IOC won't go for Mixed Individual events
3. The ISSF wants to maintain discipline equality (Rifle/Pistol/Shotgun)
4. 15 medals do not split two ways equally

To satisfy the first 3 criteria with no mixed medals, the number of events must be even and divide by three. So viable numbers of medals for gender and discipline equality are 6, 12, 18. If you can stand mixed (team) events, it can just divide by three (which is where we're at with 15).

The IOC aren't going to give us 18 medals so we can have 4 events per discipline, 9 per gender. And we're not going to surrender three and drop to 12 events (4 and 6) - hat's basically the status quo minus the three events in question, which is no better! The only way to make gender equality work with 15 medals is to have mixed events - which would be fine. Mixed Prone would be great. But the IOC won't do it.

So seriously, don't get even a glimmer of hope up that Prone or 50M Pistol events are coming back. Unless the IOC decides to change their stance on mixed individual events, then the only way to get gender equity is by having equivalent events for women - which would require an extra 3 medal events. The IOC are currently shrinking the Games to a 10500 athlete cap (from 11237 at Rio), so the idea that they're going to give shooting more medal events (18 up from 15) is sadly laughable - they're directing new medals at the likes of MTB/BMX/Rock Climbing, etc - the X-Games type events, along with quota places from existing sports. The athlete cap means every athlete in a new sport is there in place of an athlete from an existing sport - not in addition to.

The obvious solution would have been to eliminate air pistol as a men's event (keeping Free Pistol), and then air pistol shooters could compete in the team air event.

An uneducated opinion/question:

Why doesn't the ISSF push for Olympic facilities that support all ISSF events, or identify the required missing facilities within the host country, and then hold all competitions in and around the Olympics?

Instead of the ISSF focusing on Olympics events only, focus on delivering and spreading and promoting all ISSF events. On years with Olympics, the only difference would be timing/scheduling of events and who has the broadcast rights.

And of course in all this discussion, don't lose sight of the fact that the ISSF disciplines and events need to be cleaned up in a big way to make the ISSF disciplines and events more gender neutral.

SlartyBartFast wrote:Why doesn't the ISSF push for Olympic facilities that support all ISSF events, or identify the required missing facilities within the host country, and then hold all competitions in and around the Olympics?

The ISSF has no say in what facilities are built, just the technical suitability of what is built.

Which Olympic hosting city will spend more on the facility by building more than is required by the Olympics?

2024, we’ll be lucky if we are shooting anything with a projectile. It will be Nerf guns and sponge rubber fencing swords they way this world is going.

David Levene wrote: Which Olympic hosting city will spend more on the facility by building more than is required by the Olympics?

Depends on what other uses they can put it to. I think the real key to being a successful host city is to have as many of the facilities as possible already exist.

I'll add that one option would be to do what the fencers wound up doing - rotate the events. Not all events get held in every Olympic Games, they don't have the quota slots.