Ski Mountaineering will be proposed as an additional sport to the programme of the Olympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026, the International Olympic Committee said in a statement released on Friday. The IOC Executive Board has forwarded this proposal to the next IOC Session in July in Tokyo.

The Sport is governed by the International Ski Mountaineering Federation (ISMF) and the Organising Committee of the Olympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026 had officially proposed the inclusion of Ski Mountaineering as an additional sport to the programme of this particular edition of the Games.

The proposal to include Ski Mountaineering consists of 5 new medal events – two men’s events (Sprint/Individual), two women’s events (Sprint/Individual), one mixed-gender relay event along with 48 athlete quotas (24 men/24women) to be found within the overall framework of the 2,900 quota.

The same five Ski Mountaineering events had also contributed to the success of the Winter Youth Olympic Games Lausanne 2020

The IOC Executive Board also highlighted some key features of ski mountaineering to support its potential inclusion.

These included the popularity of Ski Mountaineering in Italy, with deep historical and sporting roots across the alpine regions.Also, Ski Mountaineering has become a fast-growing winter sport among amateur/weekend practitioners with Europe being the continent where ski mountaineering has the biggest development. However, over recent years more and more participants, at both professional and amateur level, have been detected all over the globe.

The recommendation for the inclusion of ski mountaineering in the sport programme of Milano Cortina 2026 will be discussed and finalised at the IOC Session on 20-21 July 2021 in Tokyo. The determination of the full event programme and athlete quotas will be held at the IOC EB meeting in June 2022.