It is quite likely that the majority of readers have not been tuning into the Versus television network as of late to catch the IAAF World Track and Field Championships being held in Osaka, Japan this week. That aside, the fact that the coverage even exists, and happens to be as extensive as it has been is quite a step up from what usually occurs; but I’ll save all the propaganda about athletics (track and field) being the second most popular sport in the world behind soccer and just say that it is nice to see such an event being televised. I should also add that the last World Championships held in Helsinki in 2005 could not be found on US television.
Typically, track and field coverage is either an hour long program on NBC on a Saturday or Sunday or about an hour and a half on ESPN 2 where the diversity of events covered is mediocre at best. I say typically of course, because those numbers don’t hold true during an Olympics or, in recent years, during the U.S. Outdoor Track and Field Championships (which tends to get two days of NBC coverage). Those exceptions aside, Versus has been airing about 6 hours of track and field coverage a day which is a lot even for myself when you consider that only one 2 hour block of that coverage is new each day. With the Beijing Olympics set to be something to remember, I’m sure that this increase in track and field coverage is just the icing on the cake in terms of what the media is preparing in an attempt to get the U.S. ready for next summer’s games. NBC knows what a goldmine the Olympic Games are and it seems that the powers that be there are priming American audiences for whats to come with their Olympic trailer already completed and ready to air. Even Wasserman Media Group is getting in on all the fun with the company’s online sports network (SportNet) signing deals with USA Swimming, Gymnastics and Track and Field that have since resulted in the online broadcasting of several USA Championships in these Olympic sports, not to mention a couple European track meets.
The Olympics are definitely a big deal when it comes to dollars and cents; especially for those agents representing Olympic athletes, as they’ll try to ink as many endorsement deals as possible in the coming months (if they haven’t already). So the question remains, though a part of me feels as if the answer is easy enough to deduce: Is anybody else in the States as excited as I am, this far in advance?
–Samyr Laine
One reply on “Olympic Sports Getting Some Love”
I’m in agreement with you on the airtime that Track and Field recieves. It just saddens me that the only time that Atheletics is really in the limelight is in the olympic year. I have a few things said about this at zoofer dot com johnsano blog. Atheletics is the only sport that has no professional teams. In the ” United States of America! “. Come on America, you can do better than this!