So here’s a neat thing!
Crisis and opportunity are always two sides of the same coin. And with the Russian Olympic Team currently being systemically decimated by a series of doping disqualifications, the spots they subsequently leave behind are opening the doors for extra athletes from other countries to take part in the Rio Olympics.
Among those Russian disqualifications are 22 of their 28-strong rowing team. In term, this means that the Australian women’s eight squad has been gifted a late berth into the games.
And thanks to their inclusion, the Australian Olympic Team now sports more women than men for the first time in history.
The addition of eight extra women in the squad pushes the overall number of athletes heading to Rio up to 419, with 212 of those being women.
The ratio of male to female athletes in Australia’s Olympic squads has slowly been rising towards parity since the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, but percentage of women in the side now jumps up a whopping 5.2% from the 2012 London Olympics squad.
The number of women at Rio is the second largest contingent of Australian women ever sent to a games, behind only the 283 who represented Australia at the 2000 Sydney Olympics. By comparison, the male contingent of 202 is the smallest the nation has sent to a games since the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.
Kitty Chiller, Australia’s first female chef de mission and owner of potentially the most badass name in the land, heralded the move as a massive success not just for women’s sport, but for sport in Australia in general.
“Gender balance has been something that has been incredibly important in the Olympic movement, and particularly to Australia.”
“It was only at the Vancouver Winter Games in 2010 that Australia reached gender parity for the first time (31 women and 29 men), and it is a proud achievement to reach a stage where there are more females than males on this team.”“It’s a very strong statement [and] it shows that women’s sport is genuine sport. It is elite competition just as much as the male has been over time.”
The games begin in just over 9 days. Get around ’em.
Source: ABC News.
Photo: Chris Hyde/Getty.
