Remember Helsinki 2005 when there was wind and rain most of the week? Events had to be delayed and postponed and television schedules fell apart on almost a daily basis, not to mention that people in the stands were miserable much of the time. Bad weather killing the big PR event is yet another risk with putting all the eggs in one basket once a year.
You mean that one time it happened? Mmk
Well, placing most championships in dictatorships that don't hesitate to bomb incoming cloud fronts with enviromentaly hostile rain releasing chemicals ten miles out helps, you know. ;-)
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I think a few people are misunderstanding a key point. I'm not saying get rid of the Worlds. It currently drives me nuts that once ever four years - 2026, 2030 - there is no global championship. You'd run this in the 'off' year.
So instead of having nothing in 2026, we spread the Worlds out over the whole season. It's a win-win. The runners get their Worlds related bonuses and track fans have more reason to pay attention to the DL. Plus, it makes the runners be in shape and competing all season long if you spread out say the 100 and 200 Worlds or the 5000 and 10,000 Worlds?
If the 3-day champs exists and to qualify for the finals you need DL points, it feels like there is enough skin in the game? This year with not much stakes (outside of the Ethiopian 5k guys) the DL was great. If anything in ‘26, there will be more stakes. I’d like them to institute some common sense rules around participation in DL meets.
People won't go for naming a champion before the end of the season. That's against all sports tradition. Only aliens from some weird planet would do it that way.
But to make every meet matter, and get rid of pointless rounds and 2-week wannabe olympic spendfest champs meets, have the Diamond League be the qualifiers. Other meets too.
Not qualifiers to get into the champs. Qualifiers for the finals. Top 8 sprint times all season are in the final. Top 12 middle distance times, in the final. All season long, everyone will be trying to grab a safe spot on that leaderboard and bump each other off. Every meet matters.
People won't go for naming a champion before the end of the season. That's against all sports tradition. Only aliens from some weird planet would do it that way.
But to make every meet matter, and get rid of pointless rounds and 2-week wannabe olympic spendfest champs meets, have the Diamond League be the qualifiers. Other meets too.
Not qualifiers to get into the champs. Qualifiers for the finals. Top 8 sprint times all season are in the final. Top 12 middle distance times, in the final. All season long, everyone will be trying to grab a safe spot on that leaderboard and bump each other off. Every meet matters.
Then, a 2-day champs that is only finals.
I like this idea a lot.
Except that has been tried already and doesn't work - half of the best in the World don't bother to show up for the Diamond League finals, which in itself have so varying rules from year to year that more than half of the fans have stopped caring years ago. As for gaining new fans through the DL finals - just fuhgettaboutit!
As long as there is a big one-city champ somewhere in July-August we're gonna have to live with that a lot of athletes, even the majority, pretty much calls the season off right away and goes into base training for the next year.
Some of them do one or two more races/meets if they feel they can still push their season best a little and gain confidence for next season, but it's already something they do mostly for the starters fee and not for the audience, or because they/their agent wants to improve his/her rapport with that particular meet's organizer. Lots of second tier agents/teams make gooder than usual beyond the second week after a championship when the majority of the best stay home.
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I think championships like OS and WC are special because they are once a yr or once every 4 yrs. I think if you spread the WC races over multiple events and multiple months you devalue the WC title and the magic goes away. I was in Budapest but I wouldn't be there if there was only 1 or 2 events that really mattered, I think that is the case for most of the spectators. Only the marathon, I think the marathon needs a WC at a major marathon like Chicago, and not as an event as part of the WC since the line up isn't of WC quality and never will be. I think also the US has a bigger problem with athletics than Europe does in terms of spectators. If somethings is popular it doesn't mean you need to do more of the thing, it simply will devalue.
This post was edited 3 minutes after it was posted.