Flag football at the Summer Olympics

Flag football at the Summer Olympics
Events	2 (men: 1; women: 1)
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
Medalists

The 2028 Summer Olympics will introduce the sport of flag football for the first time. Two events, one for men and one for women, will be held. Flag football, a variant of American football in which players remove flags attached to the ball carrier instead of tackling them, was previously contested at the 2022 World Games.

Background

American football

Out of the major professional sports in the United States, only American football has never been an official sport at the Olympic Games.^[1] It has been a demonstration sport at the Summer Olympic Games twice: at the 1904 Summer Olympics, several games were played at Francis Olympic Field between college football teams, and the status of these matches as Olympic is dubious; and in 1932 Summer Olympics, one game was played between East and West All-Stars.^[2][3] Although several American football players have been Olympians, American football itself has never been an official Olympic sport.^[4][5] The sport has been considered by some as incompatible with the Olympics for several reasons, among them the high-risk of injury, inconvenience in the time period the games are held and its non-global popularity.^[6]

In 2013, the Olympics gave provisional recognition to the International Federation of American Football (IFAF), setting up a possible future vote for the sport to be at the games.^[7] The IFAF applied to the Olympics for 2020, but was denied, with controversy in the 2015 IFAF World Championship contributing to the decision.^[4][8]

Flag football

After American football was declined as an Olympic sport, the IFAF launched efforts to include at the games flag football, a non-contact variant of the sport where players pull off flags from the ball carrier instead of tackling them.^[9][10] The National Football League (NFL) began to push for the sport to be held at the 2028 Summer Olympics, held in Los Angeles, California, as way to improve its global popularity.^[11][12] In 2022, they jointly launched the group "Vision28" to lobby for it to be included at the games.^[13] The NFL and IFAF considered flag football a viable alternative to American football for its limited contact, low costs, and due to it being playable by both men and women.^[14][15]

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