Ballet: The Newest Olympic Sport

By Amelie
Published January 16, 2025

Would you like to see ballet in the Olympics of 2028? There are lots of sports in the Olympics with cool and interesting things to watch, such as gymnastics or break dancing. Gymnastics had over 35.4 million viewers in the Olympics this year!  But while this is all fun, one of the hardest and most interesting is ballet. There has been a big debate about ballet being in the Olympics.  

Ballet dancers have one of the hardest jobs in the world.  60-80% of ballet dancers suffer severe injuries, making it very difficult. Ballet is so difficult to master that dancers practice up to 12 hours a day! Ballet dancers have to work very hard because every dance they do tells a story, so they have to work endlessly to create that story. Some may say ballet is easy but ballet dancers spend a long time making the impossible look easy and graceful.

Ballet is popular with millions of viewers in over 140 countries. Ballet started to become most popular in the 1830-1850. One of the most popular dances in ballet is the nutcracker. 100,000 people go to see the nutcracker each year. The most performed dance in ballet is Swan Lake. It is a very popular and well performed story. 

You may be asking how ballet can score an Olympic gold medal or score points. Well the easiest way one can score is the level of difficulty of the performance. Being on point can add extra points. Pointe shoes are ballet slippers that have a block of wood in the bottom covered in fabric. Ballet dancers make a lot of sacrifices to go on pointe because of the pain of balancing or dancing on pointe. One other way to score points is how well you execute the moves, such as an arabesque. One thing that scores points is balance and straight legs. 

The dedication and sacrifices the dancers make is a clear reason to make it the newest Olympic sport!  Ballet truly is an amazing sport. The commitment and dedication shows a lot about these athletes and why they should be accepted into the 2028 Olympics.