World Games

International World Games Association

IWGA logo
First event	1981 – Santa Clara, California,  United States
Occur every	four years
Last event	2013 – Cali,  Colombia
Purpose	Multi-sport event for sports and disciplines that are not contested in the Olympic Games
Website	IWGA Official Website

The World Games, first held in 1981, are an international multi-sport event, meant for sports, or disciplines or events within a sport, that are not contested in the Olympic Games. The World Games are organised and governed by the International World Games Association (IWGA), under the patronage of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

A number of the sports that were formerly on the programme of the World Games have since been discontinued as they are now included in the programme of the Olympic Games, for example badminton, beach volleyball, trampolining, rugby sevens, taekwondo, triathlon and women's weightlifting. Other sports have been Olympic sports in the past (like tug of war).

Some of the sports that are currently held at the World Games are acrobatic gymnastics, ultimate, orienteering, body building, powerlifting, finswimming, squash, billiards, water skiing, and dance sport. The sports that are included in the World Games are limited by the facilities available in the host city; no new facilities may be constructed for the games. Up to now between 25 and 35 sports have included in the programme of The World Games. The IWGA, in coordination with the host city, can invite some sport to participate in the "invitational" programme. No official World Games medals are awarded to invitational sports.

Editions

Year	Location	Hosts	Athletes* / Countries	Sports (Off./Inv.)
1981	Santa Clara, California	United States	1265/34	18/0
1985	London	United Kingdom	1550/34	19/4
1989	Karlsruhe	West Germany	1965/44	19/0
1993	The Hague	Netherlands	2275/69	22/3
1997	Lahti	Finland	2600/78	25/5
2001	Akita	Japan	3200/93	26/5
2005	Duisburg	Germany	3200/93	34/6
2009	Kaohsiung	Taiwan	3235/90	26/5
2013	Cali	Colombia	3870/109	31/5
2017	Wrocław	Poland
2021	Birmingham[1]	United States

Note:

* without the invitational sports

Sports

These are the official sports/disciplines of The World Games programme.^[2]

All-time medal table

Medal counts^[4]

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Italy	138	133	129	400
2	United States	125	110	95	330
3	Germany	122	102	129	353
4	Russia	98	81	57	236
5	France	86	81	84	251
6	China	54	43	22	120
7	Great Britain	53	55	69	177
8	Japan	42	30	47	119
9	South Korea	38	15	23	76
10	Sweden	37	35	45	117

See also

• All-Africa Games
• Asian Games
• European Games
• Pacific Games
• Pan American Games

References

External links

• IWGA Official Website
• World Games all results at Hickoksports.com
• The World Games 2017 Wrocław
• The World Games 2013 Cali
• The World Games 2009 Kaohsiung
• The World Games 2005 Duisburg
• Results of TWG2009