The first-ever Olympic games happened in Athens, Greece in 776 BC with only one event – a 200-yard footrace. But in the first Modern Olympics in 1896, there were a total of nine sports consisting of 43 events. Since then, the number of sports and events has only increased. The latest Tokyo 2020 edition featured 33 sports and 339 events and had over 470 athletes more than in any previous Olympic games. Here is the list of all sports in the Olympics:
-- Advertisement --Complete list of sports in the Olympics
| Sl. no | Sport |
| 1 | Aquatics |
| 2 | Archery |
| 3 | Athletics |
| 4 | Badminton |
| 5 | Baseball/Softball |
| 6 | Beach Volleyball |
| 7 | Basketball |
| 8 | Boxing |
| 9 | Canoeing |
| 10 | Cycling |
| 11 | Equestrian |
| 12 | Fencing |
| 13 | Field hockey |
| 14 | Football |
| 15 | Golf |
| 16 | Gymnastics |
| 17 | Handball |
| 18 | Judo |
| 19 | Karate |
| 20 | Pentathlon |
| 21 | Rowing |
| 22 | Rugby |
| 23 | Sailing |
| 24 | Shooting |
| 25 | Skateboarding |
| 26 | Sport climbing |
| 27 | Surfing |
| 28 | Table tennis |
| 29 | Taekwondo |
| 30 | Tennis |
| 31 | Triathlon |
| 32 | Volleyball |
| 33 | Weightlifting |
| 34 | Wrestling |
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5 new sports in Tokyo Olympics 2020
| Sl. No | Sports |
| 1. | Baseball/Softball |
| 2. | Karate |
| 3. | Skateboarding |
| 4. | Surfing |
| 5. | Sport climbing |
Sports in Olympics: Aquatics
Olympic Games: Aquatics events in Tokyo 2020 can be broadly categorized into two: Swimming and Diving. In swimming, there are individual events like freestyle, butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke, and medley ranging through 50, 100, 200, 400, 800, and 1500 meters for both men and women. Team events are freestyle and medley relays, men’s, women’s, and mixed. Diving also has two different categories for both men and women, 3m springboard and 10m platform.
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Sports in Olympics: Archery
Comes in Men’s individual and team, Women’s individual and team, and mixed categories.
Sports in Olympics: Athletics
This is the list of all events in athletics:
- Sprint (100, 200, 400, 800 meters)
- Long-running (1500, 10000m for men and 5000m for women)
- Hurdles (110, 400 meters)
- Walking (20km, 50km only for men)
- 3000m Steeplechase
- Decathlon for men
- Heptathlon for women
- Marathon
- Long jump
- High jump
- Discus throw
- Shot put
- Hammer throw
- Triple jump
- Javelin throw
- Pole Vault
- Relay (4*100m and 4*400m)
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Sports in Olympics: Badminton
Singles, Doubles, and Mixed doubles.
Sports in Olympics: Baseball
Olympic Games: Only six teams competed in the baseball tournament in Tokyo 2020. They are Israel, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, the USA, the Republic of Korea, and Japan.
Favorites: USA and Japan
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Sports in Olympics: Basketball
Olympic Games: A total of 12 teams competed in each Men’s and Women’s basketball tournament with three groups of 4 teams played to qualify for knockouts.
Favorites: US and China in Women’s and France and US in Men’s.
Sports in Olympics: Boxing
Olympic Games: For women’s boxing, there are five categories depending on the weight range – featherweight, flyweight, lightweight, middleweight, and welterweight. Men have three extra categories apart from these – Light heavyweight, heavyweight, and super heavyweight.
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Sports in Olympics: Canoeing
Olympic Games: There are two major distinctions: Canoe Slalom and Canoe Sprint. Both have C events which are Canoeing and K events which are Kayaking. Canoe Slalom is an individual event while Canoe Sprint has both individual and team events. Moreover, team events are split into two – 2-a-team and 4-a-team categories. Events also differ in distance from 200m to 500m to 1000m.
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Sports in Olympics: Cycling
Olympic Games: Men’s and Women’s cycling has road cycling events and individual time trial events.
Sports in Olympics: Beach Volleyball
Beach volleyball is similar to indoor volleyball and is a team sport played by two teams of two or more players on a court divided by a net.
Sports in Olympics: Equestrian
Comes in three different events namely dressage, eventing, and jumping in both individual and team categories.
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Sports in Olympics: Fencing
Foil, Sabre, and Epee are the three fencing events in which men and women participate individually and in teams.
Sports in Olympics: Field Hockey
All Olympic sports: One of the oldest team sports to feature in the Olympics. Men and Women compete in two 6-teamed pools to qualify for the quarter-finals.
Favorites: India, Australia, Belgium in Men’s and Australia, Netherlands, and Germany in Women’s.
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Sports in Olympics: Football
All Olympic sports: 12 teams in Women’s football are divided into three groups while 16 teams are divided into four groups in Men’s football. Most of the players should be under the age of 23.
Favorites: Men’s – Spain, Japan, and Korea, Women’s – the USA, Canada, and Australia
Sports in Olympics: Golf
All Olympic sports: It’s an individual competition where players contest in four rounds to determine the winners.
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Sports in Olympics: Gymnastics
The events in gymnastics involve:
- Artistic individual
- Artistic team
- Floor
- Vault
- Horizontal bars (Men’s)
- Parallel bars (Men’s)
- Pommel horse (Men’s)
- Rings (Men’s)
- Balance beam (Women’s)
- Uneven bars (Women’s)
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Sports in Olympics: Handball
All Olympic sports: 12 teams are split into two groups for both Men’s and Women’s handball tournaments.
Favorites: Denmark and Norway in Men’s and Norway in Women’s.
Sports in Olympics: Judo
Judo events are categorized by weight classification. Men’s starting from 60 kg to 100+ kg are divided into seven different events. Women’s seven categories range between 48 and 78+ kg. It also has one mixed team event.
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Sports in Olympics: Karate
All Olympic sports: Kata and Kumite are the two events where Kumite is again divided into three depending on the weight limit. For men, it’s 67 kg, 75 kg, and 75+ and for women, it’s 55 kg, 61 kg, and 61+.
Sports in Olympics: Pentathlon
All Olympic sports: Modern pentathlon is a fusion of five individual events; cross-country run, freestyle swimming, epee fencing, pistol shooting, and show jumping. A total of 36 athletes participated in the men’s and women’s pentathlon each in Tokyo 2020.
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Rowing
Rowing has seven events each for men and women. They are Coxless four, Coxless pair, Double sculls, Men’s and Women’s eight, Lightweight double sculls, Quadruple sculls, and Single sculls.
Rugby
Both Men’s and Women’s rugby tournament consists of 12 teams split into 3 equal groups for qualification to the knockout round.
Sailing
This is the list of Sailing events in the Tokyo Olympics 2020:
- Men’s 470
- Women’s 470
- Men’s RS: X
- Women’s RS: X
- 49er
- Finn
- 49er FX
- Laser
- Laser Radial
- Nacra 17
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Shooting
There are six individual events for men and women each along with three team events.
Individual events: 10m air pistol, 10m air rifle, 25m rapid fire pistol, 50m rifle three positions, skeet, trap.
Team events: Mixed 10m air pistol, Mixed 10m air rifle, Mixed team trap
Skateboarding
One of the newest entries in the Olympics year, skateboarding has only two events, street, and park.
Sport climbing
Lead, Speed, and Bouldering are the three disciplines of sport climbing. It was also featured in the Olympics 2020 for the first time.
Surfing
The surfing tournament in Olympics 2020, contains 5 heats of three competitors each followed by head-to-head knockout stages.
Table Tennis
Just like tennis, singles, doubles, and mixed doubles are the events in table tennis.
Taekwondo
All combat sports have categories determined upon body weight and Taekwondo is no different. Men and women have 4 different events depending upon their body weight.
Tennis
Singles, Doubles, and mixed doubles are classic tennis events.
Triathlon
Triathlon is a mix of running, swimming, and cycling. There are individual events and a mixed relay events.
Volleyball
24 volleyball teams and 48 beach volleyball teams participated in the 2020 Summer Olympics.
Weightlifting
Ranging from 61 kg to 109+ kg for men and 49 kg to 87+ kg for women, there was seven categories in the weightlifting competition in the Tokyo Olympics.
Wrestling
Men’s wrestling has two different types – Greco-Roman and freestyle wrestling while women’s wrestling has only the freestyle event. Events are separated on the basis of bodyweight categories.
