The next Olympic sport

Just as soon as I dogged ice dancing for being an Olympic sport come reports of the latest "sport" to ask for consideration in these quadrennial games.

The new entrant is--get this--pole dancing. I kid you not...

The New York Daily News reported today that a pole dancer from England, and others from around the globe, are circulating a petition for pole dancing to be a test event at the 2012 Olympics. Thus far, 4,000 signatures have been gathered on the petition.

The story in the Daily News pointed out that pole dancing has indeed moved from strip clubs to sports club where fitness classes in the, ahem, "sport" are provided. Pole dancing has even been featured on Oprah, further proof of its gaining mainstream appeal.

Hong Kong had a pole dancing competition in 2007 and other countries have since hosted similar competitions.

There's no word yet on whether pole dancing would be considered for the Winter Olympics or the Summer Olympics. And, since this is a "family-oriented" blog, let's just leave the commentary at that.