Seb Coe says track and field is well on its way to being one of the top 4 sports in the world - it's already moved up to #5

The sad thing is the Lord Seb or whatever he calls hisself, would do anything to gain personal glory.

I judge that by his gittin' rid of the 5000 and 10000 meter runs. Do not think he would not get

rid of the 1500 and 3000 if it would make people happy.

I also doubt he cares too much about the new shoes breaking records.

Just think of the attention a 12-year-old girl running a mile under 4 minutes will bring!

Cricket is the <a href="https://sportsgeeks.net/most-popular-sports-in-india/">most popular sports in india</a>, the nation having facilitated and won various Cricket World Cups. Field hockey is the best game for India at the Olympics; the Indian men's group has won eight Olympic gold decorations. Kabaddi is the most mainstream indigenous game in the nation.

Apples and kumquats wrote:

not basketball wrote:

Basketball is tiny in Europe. Certainly athletics is bigger worldwide (maybe not by certain simplistic metrics, but certainly in terms of distributed participation and interest across the world).

Tennis is also not that big a sport in terms of participation, athletics is much bigger.

Football (soccer) and cricket are on a different level than any other sports. Athletics definitely could be considered third largest worldwide by several metrics. In some countries, e.g. where rugby union is played, it is not as high as third, but overall worldwide I would say it is.

thought

You're mistaking participation in an activity with interest in a spectator sport.

Correct. Coe is probably using the hundreds of thousands (and growing) numbers of 5K Parkrunners worldwide to claim interest in athletics is growing, while dropping the 5K from the Diamond League on the grounds nobody is interested.

Coevett wrote:

Apples and kumquats wrote:

thought

You're mistaking participation in an activity with interest in a spectator sport.

Correct. Coe is probably using the hundreds of thousands (and growing) numbers of 5K Parkrunners worldwide to claim interest in athletics is growing, while dropping the 5K from the Diamond League on the grounds nobody is interested.

Except for a few hundred deadenders on letsrun, 5000m & 10000m on 400m track are awful television. Tune in with 900m to 5000m and tune in with 1500m to go in 10000m and one has seen everything there is to see. What were I.O.C. thinking in 1912?

* Add 3000m race sans barriers. 3000m sans barriers is about the longest we can go in tv era without commercial breaks.

* Add 200m straight away. In U.S. high schools and small colleges, 1930s to 1950s, 220 yard straight away was a standard T&F event. Pure speed. Athletes will not have to hold back a bit first 100m worrying about a lane violation.

* Add 200m low hurdles. In U.S. high schools & small colleges, 1930s to 1950s, 220 yard low hurdles was a standard T&F event.

* Add an off-site XC event, app. 12.5K. XC with water on course and bales of hay on course. XC at W.C. and Olympics makes it easier to get 5K & 10K fans to shut up and get with the program. 5K & 10K on 400m track is bad tv. There is no debating that point.

He obviously meant his top 5 personal favourite sports.

No debating?

You are wrong. But then again, you wanting to go back to what was being done in the 1930s and 1950s says it all. You are stuck in the past.

Most Americans cannot name 3 current track and field athletes. Everyone knew Usain Bolt, and the closest thing in the women’s side is probably Allyson Felix.

That is reflected in the money they make. Only a handful seem to make good money, like retire after track money.

I love watching track and field, but no way it’s in the top 5 sports in the world.

I think Seb is trying to justify his salary. Don't get me wrong, I love T and F but the average sports fan's attention span for it lasts about as long as a 200 meter race. The heyday for it, in the US was the 50s-early 70's. It's just not something that works very well, here, unless it's Eugene OR.

You must be one of few 5K & 10K deadenders.

No one ever said 200m on strait away was bad for T&F. No one ever said 200m low hurdlers was bad for tv. You offered no alternative.

5000m & 10000m started pre-television in 1912. Both events on 400m track are outdated.

Seb Coe sold out long-distance running in exchange for better T.V. I have nothing more to say.

stan the corgi wrote:

I think Seb is trying to justify his salary. Don't get me wrong, I love T and F but the average sports fan's attention span for it lasts about as long as a 200 meter race. The heyday for it, in the US was the 50s-early 70's. It's just not something that works very well, here, unless it's Eugene OR.

Exactly. Every head of an organization like Coe looks for "key metrics" that tell a story of the organization's success under their reign. When you're the head of TnF, you have very little real accountability, so you can make up any metrics you want. As long as they show a positive trend, you can insinuate you are responsible for the positive trend. As if the fact that Usain Bolt is one of the most recognizable athletes in the world has anything at all to do with Seb Coe.