Scandalous images of the modern Tokyo quintet have changed forever.
Now horse jumping will be replaced by a human obstacle course. The bull becomes a “tsunami wall”.
– The process was rotten, everything is a charade, says the Swedish Olympic medalist and now the sporting director of the federation, Svante Rasmusson, who believes his national team will boycott the first test competition.
The modern pentathlon has been on the Olympic program since Victor Ballk drew the drawings for the branch prior to the 1912 Stockholm Games. The long Swedish branch showcased a total of 19 Olympic medals, including nine gold, but is now threatened as an Olympic branch.
Criticism of the sport reached its peak amid the Tokyo Olympics. Pictures when German Annika Schleu cried and whipped her reluctant players rocked the entire sports world.
A few months later, the UIPM Board of Directors decided that from the Los Angeles Olympics, the horse-jumping portion would be scrapped in favor of a new branch. The decision was made without any support from unions and activists, according to Sweden’s President Bengt EA Johnson.
‘Extremely harmful sport’
– If such major changes are made, it is reasonable to involve trade unions and active and trained people in the process. But they ran over them all and decided to remove the ride at the board meeting. He says that the old publication did not deal with this in a modern way.
The case has already been appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, Cass, with several federations believing it was done against existing rules.
The last Swedish medalist at the Olympics is Svante Rasmusson, silver medalist in 1984. Now the 66-year-old is the sporting director of a national team on the rise. He believes that the images from the Olympics are the direct cause of what is happening now in his sport.
– I think it hurt the sport a lot unfortunately. a lot as a result. It’s incredibly sad because she’s a really good contestant, he says.
– We have new rules this year where the judge can cancel the ride at will if the crew doesn’t match, if they were in Tokyo this would never have happened.
“Everything is a scam”
But that train has passed, and while the athletes and federations are waiting for Cass to make a decision on the sudden modification of the sport, the International Federation has outlined what will replace the horse jumping.
Two weeks ago, it was reported that the branch had been replaced by some kind of snag. And yesterday it became even more clear when a test competition was launched in Turkey.
“The biggest transformation of this Olympic sport in 110 yearsIt is said in press releases.
Instead of horses jumping, there is now an obstacle course with everything from arm wrestling, crawling, balancing, and a “tsunami wall” which is the kind of wall you have to run uphill as the end. It is said to be the result of the proposals of the 1960s.
Svante Rasmusson can’t believe a word of him.
– Everything indicates that it is a scam, everything is a charade.
Wasn’t there 60 suggestions?
– of course not. There is no support for this. Pretty much all living Olympic medalists in the world have written letters of protest. The resistance holds, Rasmusson says.
County planning
The new branch will be tested for the first time during a competition in Turkey at the end of June. Svante Rasmusson says that many Swedish activists are linked to the travel there. But he now hopes there will be widespread boycotts in a last-ditch effort to stop the change.
– I highly doubt that anyone will go. We must try to stop the misery.
The change is presented as a way to save the sport in the Olympic program from 2028. But Svante Rasmuson does not think it is beneficial. The medals awarded in 2024 may be the last.
A lot speaks for itself, unfortunately. I find it very difficult to see that this would be a better television sport. Then the entire global elite will be replaced, and many active people will give up and leave the sport, he says.