Bowling Bowling is a target sport and recreational activity in which a player rolls a ball toward pins (in pin bowling) or another target (in target bowling). The term ''bowling'' usually refers to pin bowling (most commonly ten-pin bowling), thou ...

was featured in the Summer Olympic Games demonstration programme in

1988 File:1988 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The oil platform Piper Alpha explodes and collapses in the North Sea, killing 165 workers; The USS Vincennes (CG-49) mistakenly shoots down Iran Air Flight 655; Australia celebrates its Bicenten ...

in at the Seoul's Royal Bowling Center on 18 September 1988. A total of 20 nations competed in the men's and women's tournament. No bowling professionals competed in the demonstration events. It was also a demonstration sport at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games.

Post-1988 lobby

The first

multi-sport event A multi-sport event is an organized sporting event, often held over multiple days, featuring competition in many different sports among organized teams of athletes from (mostly) nation-states. The first major, modern, multi-sport event of interna ...

in which

bowling Bowling is a target sport and recreational activity in which a player rolls a ball toward pins (in pin bowling) or another target (in target bowling). The term ''bowling'' usually refers to pin bowling (most commonly ten-pin bowling), thou ...

was contested as an official sport was the

1978 Asian Games The 8th Asian Games () were held from 9 to 20 December 1978, in Bangkok, Thailand. Originally, the host city was Singapore but Singapore dropped its plan to host the Games due to financial problems. Then Islamabad, the capital of Pakistan, was de ...

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estimated populati ...

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...

. Bowling has been an official sport at every quadrennial

World Games The World Games are an international multi-sport event comprising sports and sporting disciplines that are not contested in the Olympic Games. They are usually held every four years, one year after a Summer Olympic Games, over the course of 11 d ...

from the first edition in

1981 Events January * January 1 ** Greece enters the European Economic Community, predecessor of the European Union. ** Palau becomes a self-governing territory. * January 10 – Salvadoran Civil War: The FMLN launches its first major offensiv ...

in the United States, including the

2017 World Games The 2017 World Games ( pl, Igrzyska Światowe 2017), commonly known as Wrocław 2017 (german: Breslau 2017; sli, Brassel 2017), was the tenth World Games, a major international multi-sport event, meant for sports, or disciplines or events with ...

in Wroclaw, Poland. 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. However, after its first demonstration appearance at the

Americas The Americas, which are sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North and South America. The Americas make up most of the land in Earth's Western Hemisphere and comprise the New World. Along with th ...

-exclusive

1983 Pan American Games The 1983 Pan American Games were held in Caracas, Venezuela from August 14 to August 29, 1983. The games were the first major international competition to include relatively accurate steroid testing.Taylor, William N., ''Anabolic Steroids and the ...

, bowling appeared as an official sport with full medal status at the

1991 Pan American Games The 1991 Pan American Games were held in Havana, Cuba from August 2 to August 18, 1991. There were 4,519 athletes from 39 countries of the PASO community, with events in 33 different sports. The main stadium was the Estadio Panamericano, a mul ...

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.

Sport for the 2020 Summer Olympics

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 , officially the and also known as , was an international multi-sport event held from 23 July to 8 August 2021 in Tokyo, Japan, with some preliminary events that began on 21 July. Tokyo was selected as the host city during the 1 ...

. 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.Sports that may soon be Olympic events include bowling, climbing, karate, and surfing
/ref> However, in September 2015, it was announced that bowling, together with wushu and

squash Squash may refer to: Sports * Squash (sport), the high-speed racquet sport also known as squash racquets * Squash (professional wrestling), an extremely one-sided match in professional wrestling * Squash tennis, a game similar to squash but pla ...

, were left out for 2020. The 2020 Olympic Committee wanted sports that appeal to youth and would not require building new facilities to reduce cost.Tenpin bowling misses Olympic Games inclusion
/ref>

References

{{Sports at the Olympics Olympics Discontinued sports at the Summer Olympics 1920 Summer Olympics events Olympic demonstration sports