Larry Rawson Retires from TV

I agree that our sport needs to be more about competition then breaking records.

Breaking a record is a bit time event for a sport but it only creates short lived enthusiasm. Look at Football and Baseball. We watch those sports every week because of the competition, not records being broken.

Just today, that stupid magazine Runner's World tweeted about Ryan and Deena running this weekend (Good!!) but turned around and asked if we are going to see any records (Bad!!!). This implies that the only time our sport is interesting is if there is a world record broken.

I am a huge fan of this sport and can enjoy a good middle school race to an Olympic race. Competition is competition.

If the TV starts to concentrate on the competition instead of human interest crap (ARE YOU PAYING ATTENTION USATF??? I don't care that 2 or 3 athletes go to a school during indoor meets, I just want to see the damn competition), then our sport WILL get more viewers and sponsors.

Local Road Race Hero wrote:

Just today, that stupid magazine Runner's World tweeted about Ryan and Deena running this weekend (Good!!) but turned around and asked if we are going to see any records (Bad!!!). This implies that the only time our sport is interesting is if there is a world record broken.

It's some random half marathon, it better not be tactical. In cases like that chasing a time is very appropriate. Needed for the sport as well.

haha, YO wrote:

You can watch a broadcast and not know much about a sport and be drawn in by the enthusiasm and knowledge of a broadcaster. Rawson never did that...

fully agree with this, YO. i don't want anymore weird nbc style interviews with elite track and field athletes looking tough in darkened rooms, talking about how much of a dream come true it is to run in the olympics. no more backstory about how their mom died or how great it is to run in arizona. and definitely no more coverage of nobodies running for "something greater than themselves." here's the kind of stuff i want to hear during lap 4 of a 5k, or mile 10 of a marathon:

"so and so is coming off an itb injury about 3 months ago, but was able to keep his mileage at 70 a week during that time, with about 30 a week in the pool or alter g. he's typically a lydiard guy, so by his standards he was a little late transitioning to a solid interval phase. we've got some of his workouts here; some highlights from that: on march 30th he ran a 12 mile tempo right at 4:48 pace, on april 22nd he did 10 by 400 better than 58, something like two minutes of rest..."

let the casual viewers hear the enthusiasm and intelligence in the announcer's voice, and let them learn through repetition what the comments mean. lots of people have run, before long they will be discussing their own running and workouts in our terms (if they're not already), and then they'll become potential fans of the sport.

Below should be the Post of the Decade!!! I know, only 15 days into it but this is a great post and I agree completely!This is what we should be hearing during a race. Imagine what that would do? People would be in awe when they hear that these guys are doing 100+ mpw.

Local Road Race Hero wrote:

This is what we should be hearing during a race. Imagine what that would do? People would be in awe when they hear that these guys are doing 100+ mpw.

Funny to mention that because didn't Rawson say during NCAA XC that the guys were only doing 40-60 miles a week or something idiotic like that?

Larry,

I appreciate your candor and your input to this in general. Who cares that he served his country and was in the investment business? Nobody cares if he was president or the Queen of Sheba or a surgeon or a janitor. It has no bearing on what he did in the announcer's booth. You seem to be implying that since he was a soldier and then a successful business person that he needs to be respected as an announcer. Maybe I am wrong? But this is like saying I have to respect Carol Lewis and her ability in the booth because Carl is her brother and she used to be good at the long jump. I don't.

I have been watching track since 1978 when I was in elementary school and I remember Rawson doing commentary even way back then back then mainly on indoor meets (he did outdoors too). They were usually on at very odd hours ... like 12:40 AM and the shows were usually just 30-60 minutes for a meet like the Sunkist Meet or Millrose. They were packed with commercials also. I didn't "abhor" the hum int stories ... it was just that they ate up a bunch of time and then they would show ONLY 15-45 seconds of a great 2M or 5k. I realize this was not LR's fault at all. But if you say that without LR, there would be very little TnF on TV at all, well ... he must have had some say on whether they show the Men's 3000m or whether we hear more about this female hurdler's relationship with God.

I also questioned why they could not ever show a full 2 hours of an indoor or outdoor meet if they were going to show it at 1:00 AM anyway on tape? They usually had competitive bass fishing or a Monster Truck festival on before and after, and the show would be usually :30, and preempted if the game before that went long.

I guess it all boils down to money. Now that I think about it maybe those 1 AM and 2 AM meets I saw were shown 3 hours earlier on the west coast? Not sure.

I am sure that I love the sport, and I do thank Larry for any part he played in putting track on the air, that has been great. I still didn't like his style though. And that does not make me ignorant.

even my mother in her late sixties (she never did any sports) was throwing a spiral with our daughter's nerf football at thanksgiving. We ALL play some football frequently and football is in our culture. And, even there, what do we get from our football commentators? Answer: a great deal of explanation of what is going on. I just don't think that Rawson did it well, because in addition to providing some concrete explanation of how fast or hard the race is, you need to know that athlete A is running an American junior record, and that athlete B had platelet therapy in the offseason, etc. He did not seem to know those things. So, you want someone totally immersed in the sport to do the commentary.

jjjjjjjjjjj wrote:

you want someone totally immersed in the sport to do the commentary.

QFE

hardset nipples wrote:

jjjjjjjjjjj wrote:

you want someone totally immersed in the sport to do the commentary.

QFE

Whatever that means ,enlightened bulb .