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The World Athletics Council confirmed the competition format for a potential cross country event to be included in the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.
The proposed event for Paris would be a mixed team relay for 15 countries.
If accepted teams will be comprised of two men and two women. Each runner will complete two legs of the 2.5km course, and alternate between male and female athletes as each athlete completes loop.
World Athletics is scheduled to meet with the Paris organising committee soon to work out the details of the proposal.
World Athletics president Sebastian Coe said he is delighted at the prospect of cross country returning to the Olympic Games 100 years after it last appeared at the 1924 Paris Games.
“My love for athletics began with cross country,’’ he said.
“When I joined my first athletics club, Hallamshire Harriers, the club president was Joe Williams, who ran in the last Olympic cross country race in Paris in 1924. It would be hugely symbolic for this wonderful athletic discipline to return to the fold after a century, and for a new generation of runners to fall in love with the glorious challenge of running off-piste.”
