Wrestling dropped from 2020 Olympics Games - KPLC 7 News, Lake Charles, Louisiana

Wrestling dropped from 2020 Olympics Games

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By Marshall Stephens - email

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The International Olympics Committee has decided to drop wrestling from the 2020 Games, removing one of the oldest Olympic sports.

The board, meeting in Switzerland, made the decision after reviewing the 26 sports on the current program. It was thought that the modern pentathlon would be removed from the games, but wrestling ultimately was the sport cut.

Wrestling has been contested at the Olympic Games since the sport was introduced in the ancient Olympics Games in 708 B.C. When the modern Olympic resumed in 1896, wrestling was one of nine sports on the program.

Dropping wrestling will allow the IOC to add another sport in the future. Wrestling is the first sport dropped by the Olympics since baseball and softball were removed in the 2008 Beijing Games. Golf and rugby will be added to the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games.

The 25 sports that are considered as the core for the 2020 games are athletics, rowing, badminton, basketball, boxing, canoeing, cycling, equestrian, fencing, football, gymnastics, weightlifting, handball, field hockey, judo, swimming, modern pentathlon, taekwondo, tennis, table tennis, shooting, archery, triathlon, sailing and volleyball.

Wrestling will now join seven other sports on a list to apply for inclusion in 2020. Those sports include baseball and softball (a combined application), karate, squash, roller sports, sport climbing, wakeboarding and wushu.

The United States has won 125 medals in wrestling, including 50 golds, one of the country's top-medaling sports.

The three candidate cities to host the 2020 Games are Istanbul, Tokyo and Madrid.

A Facebook page entitled "Save Olympic Wrestling" has garnered over 35,000 likes since it was created Tuesday morning.

Copyright 2013 KLTV. All rights reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.