Women's rowing crew taking up sport (13)
I believe the answer is:
weightlifting
'sport' is the definition.
(I know that weightlifting is a Olympic sport)
'women's rowing crew taking up' is the wordplay.
'women' becomes 'w' (standard abbreviation).
'rowing crew' becomes 'eight' (crew of eight rowers).
'taking up' becomes 'lifting' (lifting up).
'w'+'eight'+'lifting'='WEIGHTLIFTING'
(Other definitions for weightlifting that I've seen before include "Olympic event" , "Strongly-contested event" .)