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Women get more Winter Games entries; IOC to draw up gender rules

Canada's Rosalind Groenewoud won gold in the women's half-pipe at the Freestyle World Ski Championships in February.
Canada's Rosalind Groenewoud won gold in the women's half-pipe at the Freestyle World Ski Championships in February.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  • The IOC announces that six events will be added to 2014 Winter Olympics
  • More women athletes will have the chance to compete at Sochi in Russia
  • IOC is drawing up rules to prevent repeat of Caster Semenya gender controversy
  • Its executive board is meeting in London and hopes to have rules in place for 2012

(CNN) -- The next Winter Olympics in Russia will feature six new events, meaning that more women will be able to compete at Sochi in 2014.

The men's and women's ski half-pipe, women's ski jumping, biathlon mixed relay, team figure skating and luge team relay will be added, the International Olympic Committee announced on Wednesday.

Another decision will soon be made about whether to add five other competitions: men's and women's ski slopestyle and snowboard slopestyle, plus Alpine team parallel.

The IOC said it had looked at ways of increasing universality, gender equity and youth appeal and overall value to the four-yearly Games.

These are exciting events that bring added appeal and increase the number of women participating
--IOC president Jacques Rogge
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"The inclusion of these events on the Olympic Winter Games program is sure to be appreciated by athletes and sports fans alike," IOC president Jacques Rogge said.

"These are exciting, entertaining events that perfectly complement the existing events on the sports program, bring added appeal and increase the number of women participating at the Games."

Meanwhile, the IOC is preparing rules aimed at preventing a repeat of the Caster Semenya gender controversy.

The South African runner's 800-meters victory as an 18-year-old at the 2009 World Athletics Championships in Berlin sparked a furore that saw her miss a year of competition while tests were undertaken to determine her true sex.

Semenya has since been allowed to return to running as a woman by the International Association of Athletics Federations, but the IOC is hoping to avoid such embarrassment at the 2012 London Olympics.

The IOC's executive board is meeting in the British capital this week and has agreed on the rules in principle, the UK Press Association reported on Tuesday.

"My opinion is that there will not be many such cases," IOC medical commission chairman Professor Arne Ljungqvist told PA.

"My experience in the last several years is that there has been a handful of cases over the last 10 years. I feel to start with it would be advisable for sport to have a panel of experts who can gain more experience of these cases so that they can be dealt with in a consistent way.

"I would probably personally recommend the identification of a number of experts to gain the necessary expertise in the near future."