by Kelly Campbell
It’s summer 2024, which means if you’re not glued to the TV screen watching Team USA take home gold, you’ve at least heard about the triumphs of athletes like Simone Biles, Katie Ledecky, and Noah Lyles. As you root for Team USA across a wide array of Olympic sports, you might wonder, what about pickleball?
It seems like the Olympics include so many sports, both obscure and well-known. While cultural differences certainly play a role, with more of the seemingly “out there” to us sports being more popular in other countries, we do have to wonder: How is breakdancing an Olympic sport while pickleball, the fastest-growing US sport, is not?
Pickleballers have been hoping for pickleball’s Olympic moment for years now. When you consider pickleball’s enormous growth rate over the last four years (since the last Olympic Games), it feels like we might be getting close to our moment.
So, when are we set to see a Michael Phelps of pickleball? Well, it’s complicated.
Olympics History & Evolution
The first Olympic Games were held in 1896 and featured nine sports. Since then, nearly 50 summer sports have appeared in the Games. While some sports have had a firm presence since the first Olympics, new sports can be added, and some sports have on-again off-again relationships with the Olympics.
The 2024 Olympic Games are currently taking place in Paris with 32 sports, 329 events, and 10,500 athletes across the 206 represented countries. We already know that the 2028 Olympics will be home, and will take place in Los Angeles, CA.
This year in Paris, you probably recognize major sports like gymnastics, basketball, tennis, and volleyball. Some newer sports are hard to wrap our heads around. In recent years, the Olympics unveiled sports like surfing, skateboarding, and sport climbing. Handball and 3-on-3 basketball are also on the schedule. Breakdancing, or “breaking” made its debut this Olympics. It’s hard to believe that some lesser-known sports are in the Games, but pickleball is not.
These sports might just be more popular outside of the US, and any sport that hits the Olympic criteria is fair game.
Olympic Sports Criteria
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) Executive Board chooses Olympic sports based on 35 criteria across five categories. A sport is eligible if it “compl(ies) with the Olympic Charter, the World Anti-Doping Code, and the Olympic Movement Code on the Prevention of the Manipulation of Competition.” You can find out more about the criteria here.
Key Olympic Sport Notes & Criteria:
- A sport must be recognized by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). According to Britannica, a sport can be recognized by the IOC and still not be selected for the Olympics, which is the case for bowling and chess. When a sport is recognized, it moves to International Sports Federation (IF) status.
- The sport’s IF must file a petition establishing eligibility to the IOC. Once filed, the IOC will select an activity as a discipline, an event, or a sport. The IOC has many rules that dictate whether or not a sport will be accepted. Some of them include:
- Wide recognition: “A sport must be widely practiced by men in at least 75 countries and on four continents and by women in no fewer than 40 countries and on three continents. “
- A sport must increase the “value and appeal” of the Olympic Games and uphold and reflect modern traditions.
- No sports that require mechanical proportion are permitted. “Mind sports” like chess are also not permitted.
- IOC considers media and public interest as well as resources and costs needed to support the event. Certain sports have high-maintenance venue needs as well as a plethora of athletes to accommodate.
- Existing sports are periodically reviewed. New sports are only permitted when another sport is simultaneously discontinued.
Sounds like pickleball checks or could soon check a lot of those boxes, right? So, why haven’t we seen any matches in Paris this summer?
Here are some of the main reasons why pickleball has not yet hit the mark of being Olympic Sport:
Competition: Pickleball phases the Olympic competition on a few levels. First, with paddle sport padel’s rise in popularity, especially internationally, it could become a real obstacle to professional pickleball growth. Because there are limited spots for Olympic Sports, pickleball competes with all of the classic sports we know and are accustomed to. Some non-picklers might even suggest that pickleball too closely resembles pre-existing Olympic sports like tennis and table tennis.
Disorganization: We know that professional pickleball is still complicated, contributing to the pickleball-Olympic delay. We don’t yet have a definitive standardized rating system or singular governing body, and the MLP/PPA drama that recently unfolded demonstrates the disarray.
Popularity: Even though we know that pickleball is booming in the US, it has not yet reached international stardom. Pickleball won’t have a shot until it is popular in more countries, which is why supporting organizations like the International Pickleball Federation is increasingly important. To be included in the Olympics, a sport must be “widely practiced by men in at least 75 countries and on four continents and by women in no fewer than 40 countries and on three continents.” Pickleball isn’t there just yet.
International Olympic Committee (IOC) Regulations: Even once pickleball, the sport must be recognized and chosen by the IOC. The International Pickleball Federation is not yet an IOC-recognized federation.
Funding: As professional pickleball expands, funding increases, but it’s not enough to compete with longstanding core sports.
Legacy and interest of youth: Although increasingly popular, pickleball is still considered a newer sport, and there are still some kinks to work out at the professional level. More young people are getting involved in the sport, but it still remains a sport that’s popular among older people. We have a long way to go even before pickleball is consistently played in schools the way that other core US sports like soccer, basketball, and football are.
Olympian–Pickleball Connections
Despite not being a part of the competition, pickleball is still being represented at the Olympics by some dinking athletes. Major League Pickleball even showed some love for pickleball-playing Olympians via their Instagram, shouting out MLP owners that would be competing in Paris.
Here are some Olympic athletes (past and present) with a love for pickleball.
When Will We See Pickleball at the Olympics?
While there’s no definitive answer here, with unwavering pickleball popularity and growth, it’s hard to imagine a future without pickleball at the Olympics. 2028 might be a bit too close to hit all of the criteria, but 2032 looks promising.
Having pickleball as an Olympic sport would provide limitless possibilities for the sport’s expansion through wider global recognition, increased funding, and an elevated status to finally eliminate pickleball’s “retirement home” reputation once and for all. Take Women’s Rugby for example. The sport has not been very popular in the US. Still, it gained massive recognition this year when the USA Women’s team took the bronze medal, their first Olympic medal in history, and player Ilona Maher rose to social media stardom. After their victory over Australia, they received a $4 million donation from Michele Kang to advance the sport post-Olympics.
The key to an Olympic dink is keeping our focus on expanding the sport professionally and securing funding. So, get out on the court, recruit your friends, play in and attend tournaments, start or keep watching pickleball tournaments on TV, support USA Pickleball, the MLP, and PPA, and keep the pickleball momentum going.
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