'Keep wrestling in the Olympics' campaign started
The Azerbaijani Wrestling Federation in collaboration with the Baku City Head Department for Youth and Sports organized a campaign under the motto "Keep Wrestling in the Olympics".
The campaign aims to take up the matter of wrestling at the 125th session of IOC at Buenos Aires, Argentina and retain the game in the category of core sports in Olympic Games.
Wrestling was in a group of three sports which have been selected to vie for the final provisional sport spot in the 2020 and 2024 Olympic Games.
In early May, the Executive Board of IOC at its meeting held at St. Petersburg Russia) recommended that baseball/softball, squash and wrestling be proposed to the 125th session of IOC for possible inclusion as an additional sport in the Olympic Programme for 2020 Olympic Games.
The full IOC membership will meet in Buenos Aires on Sept.7 - 10 and will vote on which of the three sports to add to the programme of the Games for 2020 Olympics in addition to the 25 core sports.
When the International Olympic Committee announced that wrestling would be dropped from the Olympics by 2020, it sent shock waves around the wrestling communities, here and abroad.
That unexpected decision seemed to come out of nowhere, but it also sparked a common goal - to get that decision repealed.