Summer Olympic Games Los Angeles 2028 Sports Programme Road to LA 2028

[Josh 11,564]

My proposal is that this event doesn’t ever get added to the Olympic programme 

[Rafa Maciel 1,658]

Not sure if we've covered this already, but it looks like we are going to have a change to the format of the 3-Day Eventing competition when we get to LA. 

 

The IOC told the FEI at the end of last year that they had to come up with a new format for eventing and a proposal was submitted at the start of March. 

 

The changes will see the team competition run as a short format competition with dressage to be followed by showjumping on day 2 and the cross-country phase being held on day 3. The individual competition would remain in the long format with a further round of show jumping taking place the day after the cross-country.

 

The rational for the change is that the IOC and OBS wanted the medals to be awarded after the cross-country phase of the competition because that is seen as the most popular part of the competition with the biggest degree of viewer engagement. 

[JoshMartini007 2,767]

While I do enjoy cross-country, I always thought jumping was more popular.

[NearPup 3,505]

25 minutes ago, Rafa Maciel said:

Not sure if we've covered this already, but it looks like we are going to have a change to the format of the 3-Day Eventing competition when we get to LA. 

 

The IOC told the FEI at the end of last year that they had to come up with a new format for eventing and a proposal was submitted at the start of March. 

 

The changes will see the team competition run as a short format competition with dressage to be followed by showjumping on day 2 and the cross-country phase being held on day 3. The individual competition would remain in the long format with a further round of show jumping taking place the day after the cross-country.

 

The rational for the change is that the IOC and OBS wanted the medals to be awarded after the cross-country phase of the competition because that is seen as the most popular part of the competition with the biggest degree of viewer engagement. 

Oh, that's not too bad. I had almsot a mini heart attack when I read that there would be a change of format.

 

I figured they would replace the cross country with ninja wariors or whatever.

 

I'm not sure that I love this change, but I do think awarding the team and individual medals on different days is a good idea.

Edited May 20, 2024 by NearPup

[Nickyc707 382]

On 3/20/2024 at 5:22 PM, NearPup said:

Ya, golfers have been asking for a team event since day zero. If golf is going to be in the Olympics this is necessary.

Why? It's not as if they compete together normally.

[mpjmcevoy 375]

43 minutes ago, NearPup said:

Oh, that's not too bad. I had almsot a mini heart attack when I read that there would be a change of format.

 

I figured they would replace the cross country with ninja wariors or whatever.

 

I'm not sure that I love this change, but I do think awarding the team and individual medals on different days is a good idea.

I think there's a good argument that given both jumping and dressage have individual events, cross-country deserves the exposure from the team event. I can imagine pressure will come from IOC to increase the 'time trial' element of the XC.

[dodge 1,040]

56 minutes ago, JoshMartini007 said:

While I do enjoy cross-country, I always thought jumping was more popular.

Jumping may be more popular but as it has its own event, and the best jumpers are there, the jumping in eventing always seems a much lower standard 

 

Where as the cross country is its unique selling point

[mpjmcevoy 375]

26 minutes ago, Nickyc707 said:

Why? It's not as if they compete together normally.

That's almost the point. Tennis has really got into the Olympic way of things - helped enormously that the Men's Big 3/4 of the Golden Era and te Williams sisters were heavily personally invested in it., but Golf relally hasn't had that moment - Tiger Woods was pretty much done before it even began, and Rory McIlroy was, like many others, pretty lukewarm. That attitude seems to be slowly changing, but the feeling remains gold at the Olympics needs a little gimmickry, something to make it different from just another tournament, but the powers that be are adamant the individual event should be a standard 72 hole strokeplay.

 

The team event allows much more format fiddling, and importantly a) can being the men and women together, which matters to the IOC and b) can show off the other major format, a very popular one - Matchplay.

 

My suggestion, with the goal to keep the event within 72 holes total, and simple enough for non golf people to get.

 

16 teams of 4 (2 men, 2 women)

4 groups of 4

Playing short round-robin 9 holes matchplay in the format :

• men's singles x 1
• women's singles x 1 ,
• mixed foursome/alternate shot x 1

 

2 points a hole, 1 each for a tied hole, first to 10 pts(in effect 5 holes) wins - just a more causal viewer friendly way of describing the existing system (so 2 and 1 = 2 up with 1 hole left = 2 up after 8 = 5 holes to 3 (or 4 and 2 halves to 2 and 2 halves, etc)

If its 9-9 after 9, tie break is ruthless, one stroke 'nearest the pin' on 10th hole. to win single bonus point to win 10-9

 

Scores also act like goal difference to break ties, matches are best of three rubbers (obviously) 

 

So thats 9+9+9, 27 holes to get to knockouts first round where 3rds play 2nds, again 9 holes ->36 holes

 

Day three the group winners meet the winners of 3rds v 2nds, again over 9 holes, then 4 QF winners play 9-hole semis

 

That's 54 holes

 

The medal matches are over 18 holes on the final day, but same rules except the winning mark is now 19 not 10. Otherwise, same format. Bronze medal match (consisting of 3 rubbers) goes ahead of gold medal match (consisting of three rubbers)

 

That's 72 holes - no longer than a standard tournament - if you want to make it even shorter ditch the group games, simply add scores from individual to create a team score, and top 8 teams go straight to QF round (wee bit like archery), whereafter system is same, that's just 36 holes over two days - Day 1 QF, SF both over 9 holes, day two medal matches over 18...

[mpjmcevoy 375]

11 minutes ago, dodge said:

Jumping may be more popular but as it has its own event, and the best jumpers are there, the jumping in eventing always seems a much lower standard 

 

Where as the cross country is its unique selling point

The only problem I see with that is that the Olympic cross country is historically a pretty weak test because of the need for universality; if it is the same difficulty as a standard elite event, it will put more limited riders in danger - indeed, it's apparently been a bug bear for years that Olympic 3Day is far too soft on XC (and jumping), and therefore gives far too muuh importance to dressage element, which means Germans have overachieved,

[Nickyc707 382]

15 minutes ago, mpjmcevoy said:

That's almost the point. Tennis has really got into the Olympic way of things - helped enormously that the Men's Big 3/4 of the Golden Era and te Williams sisters were heavily personally invested in it., but Golf relally hasn't had that moment - Tiger Woods was pretty much done before it even began, and Rory McIlroy was, like many others, pretty lukewarm. That attitude seems to be slowly changing, but the feeling remains gold at the Olympics needs a little gimmickry, something to make it different from just another tournament, but the powers that be are adamant the individual event should be a standard 72 hole strokeplay.

 

The team event allows much more format fiddling, and importantly a) can being the men and women together, which matters to the IOC and b) can show off the other major format, a very popular one - Matchplay.

 

My suggestion, with the goal to keep the event within 72 holes total, and simple enough for non golf people to get.

 

16 teams of 4 (2 men, 2 women)

4 groups of 4

Playing short round-robin 9 holes matchplay in the format :

• men's singles x 1
• women's singles x 1 ,
• mixed foursome/alternate shot x 1

 

2 points a hole, 1 each for a tied hole, first to 10 pts(in effect 5 holes) wins - just a more causal viewer friendly way of describing the existing system (so 2 and 1 = 2 up with 1 hole left = 2 up after 8 = 5 holes to 3 (or 4 and 2 halves to 2 and 2 halves, etc)

If its 9-9 after 9, tie break is ruthless, one stroke 'nearest the pin' on 10th hole. to win single bonus point to win 10-9

 

Scores also act like goal difference to break ties, matches are best of three rubbers (obviously) 

 

So thats 9+9+9, 27 holes to get to knockouts first round where 3rds play 2nds, again 9 holes ->36 holes

 

Day three the group winners meet the winners of 3rds v 2nds, again over 9 holes, then 4 QF winners play 9-hole semis

 

That's 54 holes

 

The medal matches are over 18 holes on the final day, but same rules except the winning mark is now 19 not 10. Otherwise, same format. Bronze medal match (consisting of 3 rubbers) goes ahead of gold medal match (consisting of three rubbers)

 

That's 72 holes - no longer than a standard tournament - if you want to make it even shorter ditch the group games, simply add scores from individual to create a team score, and top 8 teams go straight to QF round (wee bit like archery), whereafter system is same, that's just 36 holes over two days - Day 1 QF, SF both over 9 holes, day two medal matches over 18...

I have no problem with a matchplay tournament as we see little enough of this format on any of the golf tours. I could even live with a mixed event with two days of strokeplay to determine a matchplay field of 16 or 32. What I don't see any reason for is a mixed team event.

 

Incidentally aren't foursomes and alternate shot the same thing? Do you mean foursomes and fourballs?

Edited May 21, 2024 by Nickyc707