Actually they have been pushing to introduce MMA (Mixed
Martial Arts) into the Olympics... for those who don't know, it's a
fighting sport in which there are as little rules as possible and
you can do almost anything you want from striking to grappling to
submissions.
Which is actually pretty much like an original sport in the
ancient Greek Olympics called Pankration.
It is probably safer then boxing though, given instead of the
goal being to punch your opponent in the head until he's knocked
out, you can end the fight using a lot of other methods like
submissions or chokes which are far less damaging, and more
realistic too.
In the modern times Pankration could still be seen in cities
like Smyrna and Constantinople even in the beginning of the 20th
century. It was after the burning of the city of Smyrna by the
Turks that caused many of the Athletic associations including those
who practiced and taught Pankration, to scatter to mainland Greece
and other parts of the world and try to rebuild their lives. Of
those Pankratiasts that went to Greece, life was unmerciful given
Greece's poor economic and political stability and providing for
their families was the foremost priority. It was then where
Pankration took a back seat to the reality of survival for those
old Pankratiasts.
The revival of pankration was essentially the innovative effort
of Kerios Grandmaster Jim Arvanitis, world recognized today as the
"father of modern pankration." A visionary considered far ahead of
his time, Jim cross-trained in a number of martial arts and combat
sports before it was common to do so. This included Western boxing
and wrestling, combat judo, and muay thai. He extracted the best
techniques from each and, using his research of what remained of
the legacy of his ancestors, reconstructed ancient pankration into
a modernized form. It was Arvanitis who reintroduced the combat
sport at a time when such practices were criticized in favor of the
more traditional Asian styles such as karate and kung-fu. MMA and
even pankration in Greece would not surface until more than 20
years after Arvanitis appeared on the cover of Black Belt
magazine. It was through this ground-breaking article that he and
writer Massad Ayoob first exposed pankration to mainstream martial
arts.
Pankration has also periodically been reintroduced in the modern
Olympic Games, but not with much success due to scarce
participation. Given the rise in popularity of Mixed
Martial Arts around the world in recent years,
interest in the sport has been renewed and even talks about
entering MMA in the Olympics under the banner of pankration.
In the lead-up to the 2004 Athens
Olympic Games, a modern non-nude version of
pankration was tipped as being a new sport in the Olympiad,
especially due to its being an event in the ancient games. However,
its application was not approved. The International Olympic
Committee was unconvinced that Greece could handle the total number
of sports proposed. To placate the IOC, the organizers removed all
new medal sports and pankration missed out.
