Olympic leaps

Unlike the ancient Games, which stayed put, the modern ones moved to different world cities. The Olympics of 1900 and 1904 were folded into world fairs in Paris and St. Louis and stretched over months, not weeks, to provide diversion for fairgoers.

As a result, a period of willy-nilly expansion followed. Paris added cricket, croquet, golf, rugby, polo, and tug of war, none of which lasted long. In 1904, St. Louis introduced lacrosse and roque (a variation of croquet), which made short-lived appearances. Four years later, London added motorboating.

The Olympics program, it became clear, needed more consistency. One decision was to create a separate Winter Olympics, beginning in 1924 (figure skating and ice hockey were in the Summer Games before then). Another was to ban sports that relied on motorized propulsion, such as auto racing.

Also, the International Olympic Committee stepped in and nurtured the birth of global governing bodies for each sport. These have helped create a more orderly system for determining which contests end up in the Olympics.

This also led to trials for "demonstration sports," which are given an opportunity to test the Olympic waters in an unofficial capacity - in other words, without awarding medals. Over the years, some of these demonstration sports, such as baseball, have been promoted to permanent status, while others - like football, roller hockey, and korfball - have come and gone.

Having governing bodies for each sport makes it easier to add new events for those sports already in the Olympics. Volleyball, for instance, ushered in beach volleyball in 1996, and cycling introduced mountain biking the same year.

Of course, sports wholly new to the Games occasionally manage to crack the lineup, too, as did table tennis in 1988, badminton in 1992, and softball in 1996.

Softball is for women only, and the International Olympic Committee is keen to find ways to bring greater gender equality to the Games. Women have participated in all but the first modern Olympics, although only in small numbers initially. Now the "playing field" of opportunity is almost level, with about 4,000 female athletes competing this year.

It's tricky to include more women while holding the line on overall participation. To do this, tougher qualifying standards help limit the number of entrants, and certain events or entire sports may be eliminated. At the same time, other sports are clamoring to get in, such as ballroom dancing - and why not, since the Winter Olympics include ice dancing?

As huge as the Olympics have become, the simple sprints, which determine the "world's fastest humans," remain one of its biggest attractions - and the only event on the roster of the very first Olympics.

Sports that you might not associate with Olympic gold were part of the early modern Games. That's because the International Olympic Committee had not yet adopted the criteria that currently require a sport to be played by men in at least 75 countries on four continents (or by women in 40 or more countries on three continents). The sport also had to appear at least twice in an international or continental championship.

• Croquet: In 1896 and 1900, competitors chased glory by knocking wooden balls through wire hoops.

• Jeu de paume: In 1908, this aristocratic French ancestor of tennis featured players in an enclosed court hitting a cloth ball with wooden, spoon-shaped rackets. (It means "game of the palm of your hand.")

• Powerboating: Before the ban on mechanization, it had a short life in 1908.

• Tug of war: The old standby of summer camp and family reunions was a track and field event from 1900 to 1920.

SOURCE: HickockSports.com

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