Skip to main content

On Track #7: The Spectators

Sorry it's been a few weeks...if I keep up the goal pace of one post per week, not a chance I finish by the Olympics. Because they're only two (2!) weeks away? (Right? I'm pretty sure that's close to accurate...)

This post is structured around one simple question: do fans (particularly on TV) know what they are watching?

No, they don't. Not even close.

The casual fan has no clue about the strategies, tactics, participants...or really anything about track. As mentioned in earlier posts, part of the reason for that lack of knowledge is that the commentators also have no idea what they're talking about.

What boggles my mind is that Americans (A-murr-icans) can sit for three hours and watch cars drive around an oval, but they can't sit for 5-15-30 minutes and watch actual people run around an oval. You know, actual athletes.

People get NASCAR. They don't get track. Track isn't boring...it's just boring for people who don't know anything about what they're watching. And how can they know anything when: a) the commentators don't either, and b) commercials cut out everything that happens in the race?

So how do we educate the mass of fans about the ins-and-outs of track? Welp, I have no idea...I guess that's something else to try and diagnose by the end of this series.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Base Training the Lydiard Way

This is a post I've been meaning to write for a while, but just haven't really gotten around to it. This is for anyone using the summer to gear up for a fall season of racing, whether that's a marathon, road races, or cross country. That said, this is especially for you high school and college athletes. Summer is the most important time of the season. It's when you build your base -- everything that's to come later in the fall is determined by the quality of this base. In fact, some might even say that your end-of-season peak is limited by how well you trained over the summer. Arthur Lydiard believed this. And his philosophies still form the foundation of modern-day distance training. You've probably heard (and maybe internalized) many of the common critiques of Lydiard-style training: it's old and outdated , or it's too hard, or, most common, it's just a lot of long slow distance. And low slow distance makes for long slow runners . The lat...
2 comments
Read more

Why I Love Running At Withrow

One of my favorite places to do workouts and strides and general fast stuff is the track at Withrow High School in Hyde Park. No, it's not because of the newly renovated surface. No, it's not because it's a perfect 10-minute warmup and cooldown jog from my house. No, it's not because I'm a nerd and it has markings for both a 1600 and a mile. No, it's not because the school building forms a perfect "L" around the homestretch and first turn, sheltering the field from any drastic wind. No, it's not because I spent four years during college running workouts there. Actually, wait, that is part of it. The reason I love Withrow's track so much can be summed up like this: it's a true public track. If you've ever been to the track, then you know how packed it can get with people using it. And it's not just Withrow High School teams and random individuals -- the track is also regularly used by many other local high schools witho...
1 comment
Read more

My Unpopular Opinion, v2

With Cincinnati's very own Queen Bee Half Marathon coming up, I wanted to get this out there: I absolutely abhor all-women's races. I don't think they should exist. I don't even think they should be called races. I'm not going to link to any race websites because I don't want to give them the dignity. They may be worse than color runs and other novelty events in my book. Before you call me a sexist and a male chauvinist pig, hear me out: I don't think all-women's events are necessary any more . This isn't the era of race directors physically pulling Katharine Switzer out of a race specifically because she's a woman; rather, women make up the majority of participants in running events today. Thirty or forty years ago, when road running was an all-male endeavor, women's-only events definitely had a place. But now, nearly every race is a majority female affair. Road races are already women's races -- making some specifically only  for wo...
4 comments
Read more