I am waiting to watch the men's semifinal, but before that happens bravo is showing this equestrian sport called the dressage...my word, this is the most ridiculous thing I have ever see...this even beat curling as the most unimpressive sport I have ever seen. Come on this must be the most stuck up event ever, were not only the rider looks snobby, but also the horse. I mean I don't mind horses jumping or racing, but prancing around like some fairys...this takes the cake...I going to change the channel now as I think I am dreaming. I can't believe these judges are going to see the same routine like 20 times or so, because all the competitors do the same thing...unbelievable...if this is in the olympics, then DARTS, MOTORCYCLE RACING should also be included...i am in shock right now!!! :eek:

ten metre air rifle shooting????

Most sports have a ridiculously high number of disciplins (individual, team, different weights etc...)

The number of swimming disciplins is completely ridiculous for example. And one single guy competing in 8 disciplins... :rolleyes:
Some olympic medals just lose their value!

I think we could easily divide the total number of medals by two!

I am waiting to watch the men's semifinal, but before that happens bravo is showing this equestrian sport called the dressage...my word, this is the most ridiculous thing I have ever see...


TOTALLY AGREE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
nothing to say...so ridiculous even in france they prefer see a horse walking than a good badminton match ...

Most sports have a ridiculously high number of disciplins (individual, team, different weights etc...)

The number of swimming disciplins is completely ridiculous for example. And one single guy competing in 8 disciplins... :rolleyes:
Some olympic medals just lose their value!

I think we could easily divide the total number of medals by two!

I agree. I think swimming should introduce a clause that "states" that one single athlete can only enter a certain number of events.

I'm no fan of the horsey stuff, but I think it should stay in.
If I had to choose what should be in or out of the Olympics, I would have to get rid of badminton amongst others.

It depends whether you want a modern or traditional type of Olympics.

I think I would prefer traditional
Traditional would include tests of individual physical prowess, warfare/fighting, hunting. So you keep
Archery
Athletics (running,jumping,throwing, [I would get rid of the walking events])
Boxing
Equestrian
Fencing
Judo
Shooting
Swiming (but not synchronised)
Taekwondo
Triathlon and Modern Pentathlon
Weightlifting
Wrestling
maybe something from Gymnastics
maybe something from Rowing/Canoeing/Sailing
maybe Cycling

get rid of
Badminton
Baseball
Basketball
Beach volleyball
Diving
Football
Handball
Hockey
Softball
Table tennis
Tennis
Volleyball
Water Polo

The Olympics is about global unity and transcends sports in general. Therefore, it will be watched by billions. Sports that are generally less popular to the general public should be first to be axed if anything.

But really, why not just add new sports on the Olympics "waiting list" to the Olympics instead of axing old ones. Make the Olympics even bigger.....

Most sports have a ridiculously high number of disciplins (individual, team, different weights etc...)

The number of swimming disciplins is completely ridiculous for example. And one single guy competing in 8 disciplins... :rolleyes:
Some olympic medals just lose their value!

I think we could easily divide the total number of medals by two!
Hey..to be able to compete in 8 disciplines and winning 5 gold medals so far is phenomenal!! michael phelps is really a wonder boy ;) although we r all fans of badminton..we should not degrade other ppl's achievements in other sports..although i agree dat equestrian is kinda stupid n boring..

I'm no fan of the horsey stuff, but I think it should stay in.
If I had to choose what should be in or out of the Olympics, I would have to get rid of badminton amongst others.

It depends whether you want a modern or traditional type of Olympics.

I think I would prefer traditional
Traditional would include tests of individual physical prowess, warfare/fighting, hunting. So you keep
Archery
Athletics (running,jumping,throwing, [I would get rid of the walking events])
Boxing
Equestrian
Fencing
Judo
Shooting
Swiming (but not synchronised)
Taekwondo
Triathlon and Modern Pentathlon
Weightlifting
Wrestling
maybe something from Gymnastics
maybe something from Rowing/Canoeing/Sailing
maybe Cycling

get rid of
Badminton
Baseball
Basketball
Beach volleyball
Diving
Football
Handball
Hockey
Softball
Table tennis
Tennis
Volleyball
Water Polo

neil, i kinda disagree. Time dont stand still, incorporating today's sport into the olympic is fine by me, as long as that sport event demand mental and physical skills, strength, and all of other human ability. Testing one skill isn't enough to set a sport as being olympic category. Tradition doesn't or shouldnt be use as a criteria.

events i view that shouldnt be in the olympic is

Equestrian(steering skill)
skeet shooting(one skill, reaction time)
air rifle/pistal( one skill, steadiness)
diving(coordination only)
beach volleyball ( we have indoor volleyball already)
softball/baseball ( since players scratch their bums 90% of their time)
fencing (reaction time)
curling (body coordination)
bobsled/loo ( just steering/body coordination)
maybe hockey (since a player involve 1/3 - 1/2 of game and sit out the rest)
NUmber of event in swimming and rowing/canoeing/kayaking/ be reduced.

where in badminton, one require : full body coordination, stamina, power, mental game plan strategizing, jumping, bending, etc.

Hey..to be able to compete in 8 disciplines and winning 5 gold medals so far is phenomenal!! michael phelps is really a wonder boy ;) although we r all fans of badminton..we should not degrade other ppl's achievements in other sports..although i agree dat equestrian is kinda stupid n boring..

But why is okay for the Americans (Michale Phelps, Amanda Beard, and company) to dominate swimming but everybody says it's not good or becomes angered when the Chinese dominate women's badminton??

That's why only 3 teams are allowed from each country in Olympics badminton or else according to the rankings China could have sent all 5 men's singles players.

That's why weightlifting only allows one nation to send in athletes in a max of 4 lifting events.

There's so many more such rules. Swimming needs to change too.

Most sport saturate our TV coverage already and should not be included along with beach volleyball, it's just there for a bit of glamour. Why is football and tennis included if the football season has started and the best players will be playing for their clubs which pay their wages!

Why don't we include golf :rolleyes:

Most sports have a ridiculously high number of disciplins (individual, team, different weights etc...)

The number of swimming disciplins is completely ridiculous for example. And one single guy competing in 8 disciplins... :rolleyes:
Some olympic medals just lose their value!

I think we could easily divide the total number of medals by two!
also for tracks. countries who do well in swimming and tracks can easily dominate the medal count as there are so many of them!

i think we should introduce more events in badminton. firstly, we need to add the men/women team events (gymnastics has it...), and then we should have variation of the other events.

then we should have 3x7 scoring version of each of the event to test the ultra offensive. and then an extra long 5x21 for endurance, and then of coursea the regular 3x15 for the all-around players.

also for tracks. countries who do well in swimming and tracks can easily dominate the medal count as there are so many of them!

i think we should introduce more events in badminton. firstly, we need to add the men/women team events (gymnastics has it...), and then we should have variation of the other events.

then we should have 3x7 scoring version of each of the event to test the ultra offensive. and then an extra long 5x21 for endurance, and then of coursea the regular 3x15 for the all-around players.

LOL...that hella funny...lets also add only clear/smash version and half court singles, and ultra crazy half court doubles...lets give everyone a chance to get medal so china korean indonesia denmark, etc can have like 5 golds each

I would really like to see competitive darts than archery...so much more exciting...archery is like machine hit the same target all the time...in darts the scoring emphasizes that you have to be able to hit anywhere in the board...I say it requires 3 times more skill than shooting or archery...archery cuz you hit the same kind of target and area repetitively, and shooting because the gun has to much precision, only error is committed by user, as for darts you have to hit different areas to win, you use ur hand and arm to throw, less precision than a gun.but at the world class level not that much less. Plus the way it is setup it is so intense and to win you have to hit an ultra precise area of the board...no amatuer would stand a chance against a seasoned pro, almost no lucky crap you see in archery or air shooting.

i took a glance at the atlethic program,excluding walking,decathlon, just on running:

Men & Women

100m
110m hurdle
200m
400m
800m
1500m
10,000m
4x100m
4x400m

9 events just on running for each gender

badminton has 2.5

well, yeah, good point, we need to have a one-person all around as well. who can play the best in singles, doubles, mixed will win.

Ra and Gao Ling will be head to head on this one!

well, yeah, good point, we need to have a one-person all around as well. who can play the best in singles, doubles, mixed will win.

Ra and Gao Ling will be head to head on this one!

while we at it, why only use team format for TC and UC, we can have team format in the olympic too :)

Ya, there were talks on another forum about increasing medal events for some sports... namely table tennis.

Imagine this: have beach(or another environment) variations, have different score variations, have multiball (ie. use 2 table tennis ball or two shuttles at the same time) variations, have 3 vs 3 (or other combos)...... The list is endless... then we will see how everybody likes it when China takes 34 of 50 medals!!!!! :D :D :) :) :p :p

if they put events using nylon shuttles, canada can do quite well LOL

so far canada has only 2 medals, silver in trampoline and bronze in diving.
both aren't olympic grade sports in my eyes.

there was a talk of bringing horseshoe throwing into the game ;)

I think all games which required subjective judging should be removed or exclude the artistic element out grading process.

OK so here should be the new badminton events :

MS under 1,70m
MS under 1,75m
MS under 1,80m
MS under 1,85m
etc... (same for WS and so on)

+ team events (men,women,mixed)
+ beach events (hey they've got beach volley, why not beach badminton)

any other ideas so that everyone gets medals? :p

(I just have a feeling IOC will not agree however...)

OK so here should be the new badminton events :

MS under 1,70m
MS under 1,75m
MS under 1,80m
MS under 1,85m
etc... (same for WS and so on)

+ team events (men,women,mixed)
+ beach events (hey they've got beach volley, why not beach badminton)

any other ideas so that everyone gets medals? :p

(I just have a feeling IOC will not agree however...)

We could change the height incraments to every other cm so at least if there are a group of the same height they'd all get something :p

Guys, it would be awesome to triple or quadruple the number of badminton medals at the Olympics and I think some of the ideas I posted earlier will work ( :D :D :rolleyes: ).

Now, the only hard problem and question is, who's gonna write the letter and petition to the IOC?? :D

Dibs out!

In the history of the modern Olympics, there have only been about 3 or 4 sports eliminated, but new ones are always being added. The list continues to grow, which is why I don't take the talk of badminton being dropped seriously.

well, some of those swiming and running events do not take up much time,
unlike a badminton WD match

e.g. if there are 64 competitors in the 100m, you have 8 heats with 8 in each
taking 10 seconds to run and a few minutes of admin
and then either semis or a final.
The whole event completed in about 30 minutes

I agree about things that are judged on artistic merit. Get rid of them.

Bowling is another game dat I would like 2 nominate to the Olympics committe~~ itz enjoyable to watch and require precision, strength and mental toughness etc ... another interesting event would be to climb mountain or climb steps like marathon lol~~

Badminton, cycling, marathon along with gymnastics require many many months of hard work and should have a higher "GOLD CONTENTS" than events like Synchronise diving (I bet they spend more times climbing up steps than they dive..)

Lets say that there are 40 gold medals in the Soccer event (men and women), to be fair I think they should have the same amount of "Gold" divided evenly in the Badminton event too. Making it basically "8 ordinary gold medals" worth of gold in each individual badminton event gold medal (Mens singles and doubles, Womens singles doubles, Mix equal to 5 events), now that sounds a little fairer

After losing in my weekly texas holdem game and watching a fantastic table tennis game of offense against defense, now comes the event that inspired me to start this thread...dressage...damn horses...funny thing is I always wanted to ride a horse, maybe I should try it and maybe that will change my opinion of this so called sport...things to think about,... maybe I am alittle drunk and rambling...drink a 40oz bud have to say it not as bad as I thought it would be but has a bad aftertaste, still would buy a heiny instead.

Equestrian definitely should not be in the Olympics. It's the horses that are competing, not human.

The next one that need to go is Sailing. Too much high tech involved in building sail boats.

OK so here should be the new badminton events :

MS under 1,70m
MS under 1,75m
MS under 1,80m
MS under 1,85m
etc... (same for WS and so on)

+ team events (men,women,mixed)
+ beach events (hey they've got beach volley, why not beach badminton)

any other ideas so that everyone gets medals? :p

(I just have a feeling IOC will not agree however...)

How about doing it by weight? It would be great to see some heavyweight badminton players :D

extra badminton events

coached and uncoached singles (in the spirit of coxed and coxless rowing)

tag singles (you can tag your partner on court and take a breather :) as in the cycling madison)

5point, 10 point, 15 point 20 point singles so a badminton can win as many medals as phelps or thorpe

3 v 3 , 4v4 matches

10 weight categories

low net and high net versions

all round event (you play singles, doubles mixed)

style event (you play and are awarded marks for style regardless of score :) )

feather shuttle event
nylon shuttle event, yay plastic :D

how bout VOLLEY BALL BADMINTON LOL!! it's so much fun to play!:D just basically one team smashing at the other!

extra badminton events

coached and uncoached singles (in the spirit of coxed and coxless rowing)

tag singles (you can tag your partner on court and take a breather :) as in the cycling madison)

5point, 10 point, 15 point 20 point singles so a badminton can win as many medals as phelps or thorpe

3 v 3 , 4v4 matches

10 weight categories

low net and high net versions

all round event (you play singles, doubles mixed)

style event (you play and are awarded marks for style regardless of score :) )
many interesting events, we must send all of this to IBF and IOC!! :p :p

I was just wondering if their would be one of these events I would have a chance of winning... if not, we need to add at least ne more! :p :p :p
(I'm sure if we define precisely enough the size, weight and length of hair there can be a category in which I can win! ;) )

WHat sort of event were you looking for seven,,...olympic mens 170-175cm 65 kg half court five point yonex Ti5 racquet final ??:)



Its the swimming that really gets me, you see the same guy doing 100, 200, 400, 1500 freestyle then he does the freestyle team and gets five or more medal shots basically for one talent and one stroke.

Also phelps swam in one final got out of the pool , did an interview got back in and broke the olympic record in another event.

Also how do all the diving events get in when badminton mixed was under pressure. I mean there are a couple of diving pools in the whole uk , theres probably 50,000 badminton players for every diver and 5000 courts for every highboard diving venue.

I mean do we really need synchro diving?? Might as well have synchro vault or floor in gymnastics. There are about 40 medals just in swimming and diving.


There are 14 rowing events, lightweight events boosting the numbers. In addition 17 kayak / canoe events.

There are 14 track cycling events plus road races, 18 gymnastics (including trampoline and rhythmic)

How many athletes switch events many times until they find success, if you have basic speed you can aim for 100m, 200m, 400m, 110 / 400 hurdles, long jump, 4x 100m 4x 400m....for a team like usa with 3 athletes in each event thats around 24 places for a "speed" athlete. In badminton if you were 24 th in your country you'd be no where near the national squad, which would probably have 5 "A" players and some youngsters.

Its the swimming that really gets me, you see the same guy doing 100, 200, 400, 1500 freestyle then he does the freestyle team and gets five or more medal shots basically for one talent and one stroke.


Are you sure the same guy can compete in both 100 and 1500? :rolleyes: I think competing in both 100 and 1500 swimming is just like competing in both men singles and men's double - same basic skill but different strategy and tactics.

WHat sort of event were you looking for seven,,...olympic mens 170-175cm 65 kg half court five point yonex Ti5 racquet final ??:)
Rather 185-190cm, 65 kg, and above 30 cm hair length. Their shouldn't be too many opponents in this category should there?? :p


Its the swimming that really gets me, you see the same guy doing 100, 200, 400, 1500 freestyle then he does the freestyle team and gets five or more medal shots basically for one talent and one stroke.

Also phelps swam in one final got out of the pool , did an interview got back in and broke the olympic record in another event.

Also how do all the diving events get in when badminton mixed was under pressure. I mean there are a couple of diving pools in the whole uk , theres probably 50,000 badminton players for every diver and 5000 courts for every highboard diving venue.

I mean do we really need synchro diving?? Might as well have synchro vault or floor in gymnastics. There are about 40 medals just in swimming and diving.


There are 14 rowing events, lightweight events boosting the numbers. In addition 17 kayak / canoe events.

There are 14 track cycling events plus road races, 18 gymnastics (including trampoline and rhythmic)

How many athletes switch events many times until they find success, if you have basic speed you can aim for 100m, 200m, 400m, 110 / 400 hurdles, long jump, 4x 100m 4x 400m....for a team like usa with 3 athletes in each event thats around 24 places for a "speed" athlete. In badminton if you were 24 th in your country you'd be no where near the national squad, which would probably have 5 "A" players and some youngsters.
Yes, I completely agree! :mad:

I'm wondering why they don't do an Olympics games badminton team ... with that it will be more longer and more exciting LoL =p or maybe this is too much with TC/UC and sudirman cup :rolleyes:

I'm wondering why they don't do an Olympics games badminton team ... with that it will be more longer and more exciting LoL =p or maybe this is too much with TC/UC and sudirman cup :rolleyes:

and retiire THE DRESSSAGE !!!

retire artistic...non combative events...because I don't know who won any of those events...good job everyone...you all had a chance to win because anytime someone could give you a crazy score, so next time look pretty, that should be enough...good job paul hamm, now I know better than to think the best person wins in these type of events, because judges can't enter starting values and miss all kind of deductions every time... so congrat on being able to get away with the most errors and win the gold...u are the best cheater... :)

Any idea why squash isn't an olympic sport? How did it get left out when tennis, badminton and table tennis made it in? (also, the UK are good at it:p )

Any idea why squash isn't an olympic sport? How did it get left out when tennis, badminton and table tennis made it in? (also, the UK are good at it:p )

maybe it will be back in the 2012 games

see http://www.worldsquash.org/wsf/olympicgames.html

Any idea why squash isn't an olympic sport? How did it get left out when tennis, badminton and table tennis made it in? (also, the UK are good at it:p ) In order to be an Olympic sport, a sport has to be developped in all five continents and with a reasonable number of competitive nations or at least nations having an important interest in the sport.
I don't think squash generates so much interest worldwide but I may be wrong.
One thing is sure : In France not many people bother about squash, it is more seen as a top executive's entertainment than as a real competitive sport...

In order to be an Olympic sport, a sport has to be developped in all five continents and with a reasonable number of competitive nations or at least nations having an important interest in the sport.
I don't think squash generates so much interest worldwide but I may be wrong.
One thing is sure : In France not many people bother about squash, it is more seen as a top executive's entertainment than as a real competitive sport...
I'm from Africa, and I don't think badminton can be regarded as being well developed there !!
I think only South Africa (maybe Mauritius) has reasonable interest in it. In Zimbabwe, I think there were about 300 players, mainly in church hlls with low rooves :(

In Southern Africa, Squash seems to be a lot more popular than badminton:confused:

It's true Africa is the continent where badminton is the less developped... I think Nigeria has quite a lot of badminton and good players in fact, but unfortunately no budget to travel to international competitions...
In general, the main problem of african badminton is lack of funds! :(

About squash, though it is only a very secondary sport in France (more as an entertainment as I said before), I think we still have some world top 10 players... there musn't be a very high level of competition in the world!... :p

In order to be an Olympic sport, a sport has to be developped in all five continents and with a reasonable number of competitive nations or at least nations having an important interest in the sport.
I don't think squash generates so much interest worldwide but I may be wrong.
One thing is sure : In France not many people bother about squash, it is more seen as a top executive's entertainment than as a real competitive sport...
it is more popular in HK & UK. squash courts can be found in mnay sports complexes in HK and secondary schools in the UK have regular matches.

squash however is not popular in the US, in the US they play racquetball which is also played in a room (larger) but with a bouncy ball. as a squash player, i find squash more interesting to watch. racquetball isn't popular in other countries as far as i can tell.