What skateboarding will look like in the 2020 Olympics

After reading the recent Sal Barbier Interview on the Chrome Ball Incident, (which is fantastic by the way), and also perusing the recent Thrasher Magazine article on skateboarding in the Olympics, I became curious as to what the proposed format is going to be like. Being that there have historically been many different competitive formats in skateboarding's long history (street, vert, mega ramp, luge, freestyle, etc. etc.), I couldn't help but be curious. After pondering the different possibilities I was able to track down someone from the International Olympic Committee (IOC)  who had some answers.

First how did the International Olympic Committee (IOC) come to the decision to include skateboarding? Was it someone on the committee who proposed it or if it was brought forth by a third party?

The addition of Skateboarding to the Olympic programme in the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 resulted from an 18-month process called the OCOG Proposal, where the host city (in this case, Tokyo) had the opportunity to propose one or more events in additional sports to their edition of the Olympic Games. The Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (OCOG) proposed Baseball/Softball, Karate, Skateboarding, Sport Climbing and Surfing. The IOC Session, at its most recent meeting in Rio de Janeiro last summer, approved the inclusion of these five new sports.

What will the format be for competition? There are many different kinds/styles of skateboarding so will there be different kinds or will it be just one form? 

Regarding the formats and other technical questions, a report was produced last year with all this information and published on the IOC’s website. You can find a link here, with the relevant Skateboarding information starting on page 30.

Who will the judges be for the skateboarding events? As you may know, skateboarding is a very objective event, so I imagine judging may be a challenge. 

As for your question regarding judges, they are considered as officials, and according to the Olympic Charter (Rule 46, Bye-Law 1), the International Federation has the responsibility of selecting the international and national officials for the sport. 

How many countries have expressed interest in participating? 

When it comes to participation, all 206 National Olympic Committees (NOC) will have the opportunity to qualify for the set number of quota places that are available while keeping in mind the need for universal representation and the participation of the world’s best athletes.

If you click through the link to the full report, it appears that they are basing their competitive format off of Street League, however I found that the images have an X Games kind of feel to it as well. I am somewhat hopeful that skateboarding will be represented well, however am also skeptical that they will remain true to what we know and love. Guess we'll just have to wait and see..