Cross Country in Olympics: Teams and Individuals? Drop track 10000?

I think they should find a way to incorporate XC into the opening ceremonies.

i'm all for dropping the 10000 if it gets us xc - olympic xc would be triple plus awesome. Day one - first event. boom.

imagine the pageantry, the colors, the simplicity of 200 runners charging away from the start.

It should be the first medal of every olympics - the most elemental sporting event ever.

no xc and get rid of all events over 800m - they are all jogfests anyway.

sthiop wrote:

TSO yo wrote:

"So you believe all swimming events except freestyle should be removed from the Olympics?"

Yes!

"What about diving from different heights?"

Yes!

"What about race-walking? What about Velodome cycling? What about open water kayaking and canoeing? Where do you draw the line?"

Yes, Yes, Yes and Yes!

The Olympics have become a mess, a ridiculous amount of second-tier and judged sports. It's all about the money, so I don't have any illusions that it will change, but I'd like to see all the rhythmic-minor-garbage sports eliminated.

You realize the original two swimming strokes in the Olympics were breaststroke and sidestroke, right? By that logic maybe they should get rid of all the other events and bring back the sidestroke.

rojo wrote:

Plus it would come in the year that there is no world championships in track.

-Rojo (aka "the unnofficial commissioner")

What kind of commissioner doesn't know about the world indoor championships?

luv2run wrote:

Even then I suspect gymnastics draws better TV numbers.

Not at all. Track and field blows the other events away in TV numbers at the Olympics.

I never understand why people don't immediately get why x-c running in the winter olympics makes no sense. Not the danger or difficulty, but the reality of all other winter sports. They all share one common characteristic: they are all performed on snow or ice. Sure, one COULD run on snow or ice, but this is not traditionally done. One could also play basketball or golf on snow or ice.

X-C is not a true winter sport, period, end of story.

Sure, add XC, winter Olympics better than summer, but either is OK by me.

Just don't touch the 10,000 meters! It's one of my favorite track events. It's a classic race.

why not take the top seven in the xc race... no standards crap, just shoot the gun and take seven guys or girls... I think this would be awesome! what distance would this race be? 12k?

the ghost of jake powell wrote:

xenonscreams wrote:

[quote]sthiop wrote:

[quote]TSO yo wrote:

Get rid of racewalking, too.

+1

I would trade racewalking AND the 10000 for an olympic xc race.

but

the problems here are twofold:

1) space in the olympic village

2) the europeans actually can win medals in racewalking, while they can't in XC. The europeans still control the games, and they are biased to protecting their own medals.

that's why wrestlign was voted out - not a european sport (plus the gender inequality)

the ghost of jake powell wrote:Swimming strokes are stupid. It should just be a race- the first one to cover the prescribed distance wins. Who cares what form you use?

Get rid of racewalking, too.

The biggest problem i have with swimming is that the turns are so important (imagine if all running events were done shuttle run style)! They even had to make a bunch of confusing rules about how far and how they can swim under water. Yes, even "freestyle" isn't truly free.

Why hate on walking? it is only 3 olympic golds. Maybe drop the 50K for men (or add for women) so there is parity

not a swimming expert wrote:

the ghost of jake powell wrote:Swimming strokes are stupid. It should just be a race- the first one to cover the prescribed distance wins. Who cares what form you use?

Get rid of racewalking, too.

The biggest problem i have with swimming is that the turns are so important (imagine if all running events were done shuttle run style)! They even had to make a bunch of confusing rules about how far and how they can swim under water. Yes, even "freestyle" isn't truly free.

Why hate on walking? it is only 3 olympic golds. Maybe drop the 50K for men (or add for women) so there is parity

Yeah, good point about the turns. I guess all running events should be done in straight lines too, none of that 400m track BS.

I'm all for having cross country added back to the Olympics as either a winter or summer event; however, there is no need to drop the 10000m. It's more unlikely that the person winning xc would win the 10000m. Paul Tergat was a multiple xc winner did he ever in the 10000m, Haile Gebresellasie won the 10000m did he ever win xc. Only Kenenisa in recent championships have been able to win both...so it goes without saying just because you win one you're a lock to win the other!

How about this? We keep the 10,000 meters and have a 15k or maybe even a 20k cross country race. This would better suit the individuals lobbying for a half marathon in the Olympics. That's the sweet spot for many runners.

xenonscreams wrote:Yeah, good point about the turns. I guess all running events should be done in straight lines too, none of that 400m track BS.

You might be right. I've always thought that track events above the 100m were not all that interesting.

The most famous marathon in the country is point to point. My favorite local road race is a point to point 1 mile.

Add to this equation that swimming has even fewer fans than XC or T&F.

I agree with that.

a 15km XC race, 3 5km loops, hills, mud, sharp corners, hay bails, the whole shebang. make it difficult enough that doing a double with xc be very hard.

its a distance where the 5km guys would have trouble and the 10km guys might rather to the 5km double. but it would be pretty radical to see someone attempt the 5-10-15xc triple or 10-15xc-marathon.

morebeerslessfears wrote:

I agree with that.

a 15km XC race, 3 5km loops, hills, mud, sharp corners, hay bails, the whole shebang. make it difficult enough that doing a double with xc be very hard.

its a distance where the 5km guys would have trouble and the 10km guys might rather to the 5km double. but it would be pretty radical to see someone attempt the 5-10-15xc triple or 10-15xc-marathon.

I'd rather see an XC race on the last day, and make anyone who ran any other distance event automatically qualified for XC. That way no one has an excuse not to participate except the marathon runners.

morebeerslessfears wrote:

I agree with that.

a 15km XC race, 3 5km loops, hills, mud, sharp corners, hay bails, the whole shebang. make it difficult enough that doing a double with xc be very hard.

its a distance where the 5km guys would have trouble and the 10km guys might rather to the 5km double. but it would be pretty radical to see someone attempt the 5-10-15xc triple or 10-15xc-marathon.

I was going to earlier say the same thing as you and the guy you were agreeing with. Making it a longer x-c race solves two issues: it's not guaranteed the 10k winner can win the x-c race too, and it also gives something to the people who wanted a 1/2 marathon event.

I say: 1/2 marathon x-c, with extreme obstacles. A truly unique event, giving us cross, and 1/2 marathon distance which are both missing from olympics at the same time. Maybe this would have been Ritz's perfect event? And maybe throw in some electric shocks like tough mudder. Ok, mostly kidding on that last one, butif we want more people to watch, throw a bone to jogger weekend warrior/mudder people.

I think they should add the Half Marathon in addition to Cross Country and then do what Fencing does for the Olympics and rotates one of the disciplines out of each Olympics. Having an option of dealing with the Half Marathon instead of the full Marathon might also open up more cities or locations for bidding to the Olympics

Perhaps have 2016 as:

Marathon

10k

5k

2020

Half Marathon

Cross Country

5k

2024

Marathon

Cross Country

5k

2028

Half Marathon

10k

5k