Ballroom Dancing Wants Olympics To Give It a Whirl

Tug of war, which was yanked out of the Olympics in 1920, would like to get back in. The Tug of War International Federation acknowledges, however, that the sport falls on its face in the vital Olympic arena of mass exposure. "The biggest thing with tug of war is we don't get any television," says Glen Johnson, a construction worker in Orfordville, Wis., and the federation's secretary general.

You can't say that about ballroom dancing. Like tug of war, it's on the International Olympic Committee's 31 sport wiating list in the Summer Games. On the IOC's latest seven-sport short list, at least two - golf and rugby - get good play on TV. But for the world-wide mega-audiences that Olympic impresarios place high on their checklists, ballroom has outdone them both.

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