32 quota places added to archery events at Dakar 2022 Youth Olympic Games

The number of archers that will compete at the next Youth Olympic Games is set to increase by 50% to a total of 96 following the approval of the sports and event programme at Dakar 2022 by the International Olympic Committee’s executive board.

Sixty-four athletes competed at the first three editions of the Games in Singapore, Nanjing and Buenos Aires.

The additional spaces will be split across male and female athletes to retain gender equity. Forty-eight boys and 48 girls aged between 14 and 17 will compete in the archery events at Dakar 2022.

Archery’s competition structure at the Youth Olympics is also set to change.

Since the start of the Games in 2010, the archery programme has featured a mixed-nation mixed-team event. It partnered athletes from different countries according to their qualification scores.

This will transform into a standard mixed team competition for 2022 to go along with the individual boys’ and girls’ events.

So rather than the mixed team event being won by a pair of mixed nationalities, it will be a third archery medal awarded to a single nation. (This will come just two years after the senior Olympics awards its first mixed team medal in Tokyo.)

Dakar 2022 will be the first Olympics of any kind to feature full gender equality with a 50-50 split of quota places available to male and female athletes across all 33 sports.

The archery competition at Buenos Aires 2018 brought historic first Olympic medals for Thailand, Argentina and Namibia. India won its first in the sport at Nanjing 2014.

World Archery Secretary General Tom Dielen said: “The Youth Olympic Games has been an invaluable tool in developing the competitive level of young archers globally.”

“Dakar offers an incredible opportunity to inspire young athletes across Africa. The addition of these 32 quota places will expose more emerging nations to the Olympic environment while developing the Games as the highest level of youth competition.”

World Archery President Prof Dr Ugur Erdener was named chair of the International Olympic Committee’s evaluation commission for the 2022 Youth Olympic Games in 2018.

International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach said: “The Dakar 2022 Youth Olympic Games will be the first Olympic event on the African continent, which is historic for Senegal and historic for the continent.”

The 2022 Youth Olympic Games will take place in Dakar, Senegal.