2017 Summer Universiade

Taipei (TPE)

• 145 Nations participating
• 7639 Athletes participating
• 21 sports

When Taipei won the hosting rights for the 2017 Summer Universiade over the Brazilian capital of Brasilia, it was the city’s first-ever World University Games and the largest international sporting event ever held in Chinese Taipei.

A very political undercurrent ran through the 29th Summer Universiade as China declared it would not send teams to Chinese Taipei to take part in team events, but still allowed its athletes to enter the individual events.

With Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen opening the Games on 19 August, several protests were held outside Taipei Municipal Stadium, some of which raised security concerns to a point where the ceremony had to be stopped after the Canadian athletes marched into the arena. Only the flagbearers were initially allowed in under the tight watch of the police and military, of which there were more than 5,600 in all.

Eventually, all athletes made their way inside the stadium apart from the Chinese, who did not attend the fireworks-laden ceremony, during which Chen Chin-feng – the first player from Chinese Taipei to play in Major League Baseball with the Los Angeles Dodgers – lit the flame. FISU President Oleg Matytsin did a great job spinning the eventful Opening Ceremony by saying, “Some things are worth waiting for.”

Controversy even spilled over to the 30 August Closing Ceremony as the Argentinian athletes marched in carrying the Republic of China flag and wearing wigs of ROC colours. A day later, Argentina was hit with an official warning from the FISU over its actions.

On the field of play, the Taipei Universiade saw the addition of eight sports to its official programme – archery, badminton, baseball, golf, taekwondo, weightlifting, roller skating and wushu, the Chinese martial art. Billiards was included as a demonstration sport for which the medals awarded did not count in the standings. With China out of the team events, Japan topped the medals table with 37 golds, followed by South Korea with 30 and the host country third with 26.

A total of 10,657 athletes and officials from 134 countries attended the Universiade before the torch was passed on to Naples, Italy, for the 2019 Games.