Louisiana Running Milesplit

Thoughts on this article and a cure? London 2012: Is track & field dying in the US?

I don't know if I would use the word dying because I feel the sport won't die, at least not anytime soon considering it is the longest lasting sport that ever existed, but in its current format it will certainly continue to fall further and further each year. Let's consider the downfalls:

1) It is insanely expensive to keep up to date training equipment. It's 1000 dollars for a freaking clock. It's several thousand for jumping mats. A good track is over a quarter of a million dollars. Implements are hundreds of dollars. For a sport that produces very little money, it is very expensive to participate in.

2) Refer to #1. The sport is very technical. To find officials that actually know what they are doing are hard. Even many coaches, because it is just an extra paycheck for them, don't know the rules of events but are put in charge or help mark, etc., and actually interfere with the kids ability to compete because they don't know fouls and other rules.

3) Because of the high turnover of coaches and the technicality of coaching certain events there are very few good, knowledgeable coaches in the sport.

4) Even the officials are a part of the problem. It seems that officials are more worried about if girls have barrettes in their hair than if they actually follow the rules of the races/competitions.

5) The announcers for nationally televised meets are horrible. They have idiosyncrasies that stick out like sore thumbs, they talk down to their audience, and the athlete interviews are awkward at best. I often have to listen with the volume down to bare it. The truth is only people who care about the sport are watching it. To explain every detail about how an event works takes away from amusement level. Do you hear announcers explaining every point after is 1 point or that you need to round all bases to score a run? No, explaining it only alienates the only people watching, people who already know.

6) Meets for youths are incredibly boring for most non-participants. Meet may take 8+ hours with much downtown in between events. You won't find people involved in the sport, much less people who aren't, who are willing to watch 10 heats of the 100. They also certainly won't want to watch a 10k.

7) The sport itself is divided. For the most part you don't have track and field fans, you have fans of certain events. You have pole vault fans, or jumps fans, or sprints fans, or distance fans, or throws fans. These types of fans care little about the other events outside of watching the very best athletes and also couldn't tell you much about events outside their specialty.

8) The sport has few national storylines that are good. Almost anytime you hear about the sport it is either about Title IX, doping scandals, or gender scandals. There are no worthwhile rivalries. Most Americans can name Bolt but have no clue who the top American is.

9) There is no money in the sport and athletes are quitting in droves. Most sprinters and throwers opt for football, jumpers for basketball, etc. Distance is the only type of event that has a great post collegiate corps of athletes but there is no following outside of the guys who either are, or were distance runners.

10) The head of track and field in the US, the USATF, is a corrupt, good ole boy group that is going to fail very soon. USTFCCCA needs to be the new leader of the sport.

There is no doubt about it, the sport has a large image issue and needs a lot of improvement to get back to its former glory days.

"A big part of the problem, of course, is the strength of America's four big team sports, particularly the NFL. Add Nascar, MLS, golf and tennis to that mix and you have a very congested market place."

...Since when does the MLS surpass the NBA and the MLB in total viewers within the U.S.A.?

JonathanPThomas

"A big part of the problem, of course, is the strength of America's four big team sports, particularly the NFL. Add Nascar, MLS, golf and tennis to that mix and you have a very congested market place."

...Since when does the MLS surpass the NBA and the MLB in total viewers within the U.S.A.?

@JonathanPThomas

One might go as far to presume that the bolded "four big team sports" include basketball and baseball.

Running the mile in lieu of the 1500 metres is a necessity for distance running to attain relevance with the general public.

@ the specs

You can presume that. I believe this article was written to create hype in an Olympic year by a writer from the host country. I do not agree with the author that if the sport is dying in America that the addition of Usain Bolt to the team will bring it back to life. It may increase America's medal count by 1-3. Why not write about why some European countries have such outstanding facilities and fan bases for track and field but cannot compete with America in the sport?

@JonathanPThomas

I don't think they writer was saying they need Usain Bolt. They were saying they need someone "like" him, which is something I alluded to in my earlier post. The US has no good story lines, or rather, no good personalities to follow. Not from a personal standpoint, but from a media standpoint, humble and bland athletes don't cause the stir necessary to create a buzz. What the sport would need a few rivalries that were big on not just a national but an international stage where both contestants were vocal, talked about beating the other guy, and created their own hype. Boxing has been doing it for a century. It's what gets people excited. For instance, I don't think I've watched a boxing match in over a decade but I would probably watch Pacquiao vs Mayweather if it ever happened because it's talked about a lot and both boxers are always in the news for things they did or said. Boxing has that buzz about it. Track and field not so much.

@chaz

Is cockiness the personality trait that American athletes lack on the track? Is that the necessary trait to life as a sport? If so then I say let it die! Great athletes don't need smack talk to motivate them to beat their competition. It's a job they gladly do without provocation. They would not be competitive athletes if they could not find a reason somewhere within THEMSELVES to perform better than the person lined up next to them.

JonathanPThomas

@chaz

Is cockiness the personality trait that American athletes lack on the track? Is that the necessary trait to life as a sport? If so then I say let it die! Great athletes don't need smack talk to motivate them to beat their competition. It's a job they gladly do without provocation. They would not be competitive athletes if they could not find a reason somewhere within THEMSELVES to perform better than the person lined up next to them.

@JonathanPThomas

I agree in that I'm happy Tyson Gay doesn't act like Usain Bolt. I hear commentators say Bolt is revitalizing the sport with his silly antics. I disagree. I'd root for a quietly confident guy, such as Gay, over a Bolt-type guy any day, even if Bolt was American and Gay was another nationality.

@3200guy

Zack and JT, I think you guys are misinterpreting what I am saying. I am not advocating people acting like fools, and the average athlete should not be over the top, but what the sport needs is more charismatic athletes. And you also need to take the track and field glasses off. No one really cares much outside of Bolt. Yes, maybe within the actually community itself, but it all honesty the actual track and field fanbase in America is very small. If you surveyed random people and asked them to name one current track athlete outside of Bolt, I would love to see those results. I guarantee very few if any could name one.

Also, I have a couple ideas which I think would help T&F become popular again.

1) There needs to be an "American" season early in the year that is action packed. 1-2 hour weekly shows without downtown, good story lines, and good commentators. Yes, these commentators might have to be British because the American commentators are boring. Also, current production crews need to be axed. I watched a tape delayed meet last year on NBC where they showed a false start (all 3 extra minutes of run outs and resetting) but cut the middle of a competitive distance race. It's like the producers were doing their best job to make the recording miserable for people to watch.

2) No races over a mile. Let's face it, the average American doesn't want to watch a 5k on the track no matter how much T&F fans think they do. If we are trying to target a wider audience and not just the people who already follow the sport regularly on Flotrack or Milesplit then this is a necessity.

3) Get rid of awkward post race interviews. They are horrible.

4) There needs to be some sort of team standing to get fans to feel allegiance. Maybe points calculated by shoe sponsor such as Nike vs Adidas vs Saucony vs Etc. Teams are the bread and butter of mainstream American sports.

5) There needs to be actual leadership in the sport. I can't remember the last time I heard something good about the USATF.