The 2021 World Athletics Indoor Championships has been postponed. The world’s athletics governing body, World Athletics (WA), announced the decision to postpone after holding discussions with the organizing committee. The World Athletics Indoor Championships was scheduled for March 19-21, 2021 in Nanjing, China.
Now, the World Athletics Indoor Championships has been rescheduled to be held in March 2023.
“We have been liaising with the Organizing Committee and the Chinese Athletics Association to evaluate the staging over the last few weeks, given the current global situation. There is still significant uncertainty about the state of the Covid-19 pandemic in the early part of 2021,” the statement by the World Athletics read.
Furthermore, WA stated that for the safety of athletes and technical officials, the decision was made considering the risks in bringing a large group of people together to attend the event under the pandemic and fully respect and carry out the pandemic prevention policy of the host country.
The indoor season for athletics falls within a narrow calendar window (upto the end of March). Hence, it will not be possible to extend the event to a later date in the year.
The WA remarked that Nanjing has been preparing extensively to host the World Indoor Championships, and thus, have agreed to stage the event one year after the World Indoor Championships in Belgrade in 2022.
Despite the postponement, the WA pointed out that the athletes will still have substantial competitive opportunities available in the early part of 2021 through the World Indoor Tour, which comprises 26 meetings spread across 12 countries in Europe and North America. The World Indoor Tour runs from the end of January to the end of February 2021 and is organized across three different tiers of competition – Gold, Silver and Bronze.
