Contents

Bowling at the Summer Olympics

Bowling at the Summer Olympics
IOC Discipline Code	BWL
Governing body	FIQ
Events	2 (men: 1; women: 1; mixed: 0)
Games
1896 1900 1904 1908 1912 1920 1924 1928 1932 1936 1948 1952 1956 1960 1964 1968 1972 1976 1980 1984 1988 1992 1996 2000 2004 2008 2012 2016 2020 2024 2028 2032 2036 2040 2044 2048
Medalists

Bowling was featured in the Summer Olympic Games demonstration programme in 1988atSeoul's Royal Bowling Center. A total of 20 nations competed in the men's and women's tournament. No bowling professionals competed in the demonstration events.

The first multi-sport event in which bowling was contested as an official sport was the 1978 Asian GamesinBangkok, Thailand. Bowling has been an official sport at every quadrennial World Games from the first edition in 1981 in the United States, including the 2017 World GamesinWroclaw, Poland.^[1] The sport was removed from the Asian Games program for the 1982 Games in Delhi, India, but returned four years later in the 1986 Games in Seoul, South Korea. The public interest in this edition of the Asian Games was resounding. As a result the bowling industry lobbied long and hard for bowling to be recognized as a potential Olympic sport and a demonstration sport for future Games, but the outcome was not successful. A negative factor is that bowling lacks inexpensive or easy access for youth in the underdeveloped world to acquire skill and proficiency.^[2] However, after its first demonstration appearance at the Americas-exclusive 1983 Pan American Games,^[3] bowling appeared as an official sport with full medal status at the 1991 Pan American Games on August 2, 1991, in Havana, Cuba. The medal-level competition has been held at every Pan American Games since then, including the 2019 Games held in Lima, Peru.

On 22 June 2015, it was announced that bowling made the cut from the 28 sports to the last eight to become a new sport for the 2020 Summer Olympics. The shortlist of these sports for consideration was based on applications from 26 international sport federations, many of which have applied for inclusion in previous Olympic tournaments.^[4] However, in September 2015, it was announced that bowling, together with wushu and squash, were left out for 2020. The 2020 Olympic Committee wanted sports that appealed to youth and that did not require building new facilities to reduce cost.^[5]