Türkiye secures 67 spots for Paris 2024 Olympics across 14 sports

With the 2024 Paris Olympics just 80 days away, Turkish athletes have secured 67 spots in 14 different sports so far.

Preparations for the Olympics, scheduled to take place from July 26 to Aug. 11 in Paris, are in full swing with qualification competitions ongoing.

Türkiye has guaranteed its participation in 2024 Paris with 67 athletes.

The number of Turkish athletes qualifying for the Olympics is expected to increase further as the qualification competitions continue until June.

The Turkish women’s national volleyball team will compete with 12 athletes at the 2024 Paris Olympics.

Having won the FIVB Nations League and the European Championship, as well as finishing first in the Olympic Qualifiers, which also serve as the World Cup, the “Sultans of the Net” will compete for the gold medal in France.

In addition to the women’s national volleyball team, the men’s artistic gymnastics team (five members) and the men’s recurve archery team (three members) have also qualified as teams for the Olympics.

Turkish gymnasts and archers participating in the Olympics will compete in both team and individual events.

As the countdown to the Olympics continues, wrestling has been the sport that has earned Türkiye the most quotas in individual disciplines so far, with nine athletes.

In wrestling, Turkish athletes Taha Akgül and İbrahim Çiftçi in freestyle, and Rıza Kayaalp, Enes Başar, Burhan Akbudak and Ali Cengiz in Greco-Roman, along with Yasemin Adar Yiğit, Buse Tosun Çavuşoğlu and Evin Demirhan Yavuz in women’s wrestling, have secured spots for Paris 2024.

It is expected that more Turkish wrestlers will qualify for the Olympics.

Wrestling is followed by sailing and boxing with eight athletes each and athletics with seven athletes.

Apart from the 12-member women’s volleyball team, Türkiye has secured spots for Paris 2024 in gymnastics and taekwondo with five athletes each, shooting and archery with four athletes each, swimming with two athletes, and badminton, cycling, weightlifting and fencing with one athlete each.

Out of the 13 athletes who won medals for Türkiye at in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, nine have secured quotas for Türkiye for Paris 2024.

Golden medalists like boxer Busenaz Sürmeneli and silver medalist Buse Naz Çakıroğlu will also be competing in Paris.

Other athletes such as archer Mete Gazoz, wrestlers Taha Akgül, Rıza Kayaalp, Yasemin Adar Yiğit and gymnast Ferhat Arıcan have also secured quotas for Paris.

While it is almost certain that these athletes will be in Paris, the final decision lies with their respective national federations due to country quotas.

In taekwondo, bronze medalists Hatice Kübra İlgün and Hakan Reçber have secured spots for Paris 2024.

However, the four athletes who won medals in karate at Tokyo 2020 will not be able to compete in Paris 2024 as karate is not included in the program.

The latest athlete to secure a quota for Türkiye is 17-year-old archer Elif Berra Gökkır.

The young athlete secured her spot for the 2024 Paris Olympics by winning a bronze medal at the European Continental Quota Tournament.

Türkiye has secured spots in 11 different sports for Paris 2024.

Turkish athletes will compete for medals in athletics, road cycling, boxing, artistic gymnastics, wrestling, archery, taekwondo, volleyball, sailing and swimming in Paris.

In addition to these sports, qualification competitions will continue in other Olympic sports. In some sports, athletes may also qualify based on their world rankings.

In some sports, even if athletes qualify, the national federations will decide on the athletes who will compete in the Olympics according to the rules.

The quotas secured so far for Paris 2024 show gender equality, with 33 female athletes and 34 male athletes among the 67 athletes.