The Royal Canoe Club reports that in November 2013 the Intl Canoe Federation voted to drop the men’s sprint K2 (2 person 
kayak) & men’s slalom C2 (2 person canoe) events to make room for women’s sprint & slalom C1 (singles canoe) events for Tokyo 2020. The ICF never publicly announced this, though they did announce they would propose 2 women’s canoe events to the IOC. See article here.
The ICF rightly states: “The argument was that we are the International Canoe Federation and that if we did not find a kayak discipline to drop we might as well become the International Kayak Federation. The overriding view was that we should continue to have canoe in the Olympic programme as it’s an essential part of the sport.”
The IOC established caps on the number of athletes & events (“quotas”) on all Sports. There is no indication these quotas can be exceeded. Agree or disagree – events must drop for events to be added. But don’t blame women canoeists for events being dropped. If the Olympic Charter were front and center all along (since 1924), we would not be having this conversation.
The 2012 Olympic Canoeing (or Canoe/Kayak in layman’s terms) quota was only 330 (and 16 total events). Similar multi-discipline/multi-equipment sports like Cycling & Rowing have 530 & 550 athlete quotas spots. Our Sport is woefully under-represented. Tough decisions.
The South African representative Tim Cornish quoted in this article must have missed the Men’s Sprint C2 500m in the 2004 and 2008 Olympics.
Here is 2008 C2 Men’s 500m video – less than 3 seconds separated 1-9 – same as men’s K2 500.
In 2004, less than 2 seconds separated 1st-9th in the Men’s C2 500 and only 0.6 seconds separated 1-6. Yet this hotly contested event was dropped for 2012 in favor of a women’s K1 (singles kayak) 200m event.
He also missed the 2013 Senior World Championships Women’s C1 200 final. Video here.
And lastly, the South African and Great Britain representatives both need to read the Olympic Charter:
*The practice of sport is a human right. Every individual must have the possibility of practising sport, without discrimination of any kind and in the Olympic spirit, which requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play.
*Any form of discrimination with regard to a country or a person on grounds of race, religion, politics, gender or otherwise is incompatible with belonging to the Olympic Movement.
And read the ICF Gender Equity Charter (the ICF is still behind on its own goals):
As Richard Fox (Australia) has stated: “…we cannot ignore the potential effects of continued gender discrimination throughout this Olympic cycle and what standing still represents to those that participate in, invest in and observe our sport in the Olympic Games.”
Women’s Canoe is Ready 4 Rio. But we wait for 2020.
Thank you all for your continued support!
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