This is what happens when you stop thinking of yourself as an athlete and start thinking of yourself as a "brand." She doesn't want to dilute the brand.
But that's what I don't understand, its track and field! Isnt your "brand" extremely fleeting if you dont keep doing races? I guess as long as you do olympic cycle? We only know Phelps from oylmpics.
But look at Diggins, Shiffrin, Lyles...always racing, sometimes every week.
And as soon as the Olympics roll around, she'll dominate like always and everyone will fawn over everything she does and says
No retired runners will be at the upcoming Olympics. A few will be sledding at the next Winter Games, but none in Paris. Viren won't be running. Halie won't be running. Even Malmo himself will not be there. Mary Cain will not show up in USA, Ireland, or Bhutan (chance of getting on that team at least) jersey. Why most of you are under the impression that a retired sprinter will win anything is beyond me.
Femke Bol is a rock star. I love watching her race.
You prefer the white sprinter?
This is it. Because comparing how Athing and Sydney are treated in comparison to BTC athletes when they have 6 golds between the two of them. Someone pointed out the BTC frustration gets aimed at their coach but ith Athing and Syd it's at them. They have more hardware than pretty much any other Americans not named Noah Lyles.
When they don't run people complain.
When they win - it's either people simply hating or saying they are doping.
When they don't run people say they don't love the sport or they are ducking someone. (Who would they be scared of lmao)
But I'm pretty sure someone pointed out that Hobbs Kessler raced the exact same amount of times as one of them last year and he's a hero here lol
This post was edited 10 minutes after it was posted.
Sydney and Athing are black. Most complainers here are bigoted incel white males who could not run sub 12secs in the 100M even if their lives depended on it.
Femke Bol is a rock star. I love watching her race.
You prefer the white sprinter?
No, just the one that actually turns up, competes and loves the sport! Now, pipe down you race-obsessed bigot! Reminder: you’re not a victim, and neither is Mu or McLaughlin.
agree. We're all runners here and we hate to imagine that with that kind of world class talent, neither Syd or Mu seem to actually like competing. And we hate that. We're still running because somewhere in junior high or high school we fell in love with this sport knowing taht we'll never be pros or really win races and we still do it. We love this stupid sport and it just kills us that these two seem to unhappy to do the thing that we love so much.
And it didn't seem like Mu disliked it until she went to Kersee, who has been a questionable figure (among plenty of other questionable figures) in the is sport for decade. Great job, Bobby. We have the female David Radusha and you make her hate the sport? What a disaster.
With Syd, its no more complicated than a world class performer who shows no jjoy on the track, and whose interviews come off as preachy and sanctimonious. She may be a winner on the track, but she's PR nightmare. And, as fans, we can react to that. Lyles may overdo the mugging for the camera, but man, he's fun, and it looks like he's really having fun out there. And its contagious. We need way more Lyles and Youngs (whose post-Oly trials race interview was a textbook way to handle a national interview!).
agree. We're all runners here and we hate to imagine that with that kind of world class talent, neither Syd or Mu seem to actually like competing. And we hate that. We're still running because somewhere in junior high or high school we fell in love with this sport knowing taht we'll never be pros or really win races and we still do it. We love this stupid sport and it just kills us that these two seem to unhappy to do the thing that we love so much.
And it didn't seem like Mu disliked it until she went to Kersee, who has been a questionable figure (among plenty of other questionable figures) in the is sport for decade. Great job, Bobby. We have the female David Radusha and you make her hate the sport? What a disaster.
With Syd, its no more complicated than a world class performer who shows no jjoy on the track, and whose interviews come off as preachy and sanctimonious. She may be a winner on the track, but she's PR nightmare. And, as fans, we can react to that. Lyles may overdo the mugging for the camera, but man, he's fun, and it looks like he's really having fun out there. And its contagious. We need way more Lyles and Youngs (whose post-Oly trials race interview was a textbook way to handle a national interview!).
What is hard to imagine is the pressure on them. A lot of you guys speak as if competing as them is the same as competing as ourselves. I personally remember how stressful it was on the highschool level at the state meet or in college at the NCAA regional. Those races were extremely stressful for me personally and I actually love racing. That was with just my team/family watching lol.
Fast forward to now. Josh kerr was considering not even running the indoors world championships in his home country due to all the attention and responsibilities outside of racing. When Athing/Sydney race they bring in viewers that never would watch track outside of them racing. They have people looking up to them that will never even run track. The scrutiny is on a completely different level. How often do you see posters here completely fine saying they don't want to hear about a runners religion. Sydney isn't the first or only Christian runner. Pretty sure 3rd place in the marathon trials gave a very similar interview to Sydney and there aren't complaints about her faith.
Galen rupp is very strong in his catholic beliefs. Same with Alan Webb and the Halls. You'd have to search for hours to find someone hating them for that. Other than sex you know what the difference between the girls and guys mentioned here is??
Then you have Lyles who races all the time and people are still annoyed. There's no winning with you guys. Just say why you truly don't like them.
When you hardly ever race, that multiplies the pressure when you do race. Wouldn't want to be Sydney or Athing with all their eggs in the Olympics basket.
When you hardly ever race, that multiplies the pressure when you do race. Wouldn't want to be Sydney or Athing with all their eggs in the Olympics basket.
Both call their coach a genius magician... there is a reason they barely race
Sydney and Athing are black. Most complainers here are bigoted incel white males who could not run sub 12secs in the 100M even if their lives depended on it.
It's the non-stop religious stuff that has me changing the proverbial channel whenever Sydney is in the media now.
She is young and young in her faith. Young people tend to be passionate about their passions. That's the beauty and purview of being young. She will need her faith to sustain her when she looses on the world's biggest stage. I hope it doesn't happen, but life can be a crapfest at times. I wish her well, whatever she decides to do.
You people constantly bellyache over her. It's weird that.
it's weird that when someone's actions and words are despised, people complain?
you clearly don't spend enough time on the internet. good for you
And since no one is addressing OP's point, yes, she shouldn't be bragging about God solving her problems when she obviously still has a problem racing and losing her perfect image.
I was running in HS in NJ the same time Sydney was at Union Catholic and you knew she was going toe special and we were excited to see where he career would go.
While yes she has accomplished all we thought she would (ok nobody thought she would be running as fast as she has but we felt it was only a matter of time she got the WR). But overall it is disappointing how little she does compete these days.
I can understand why she may not enjoy it seeing how she was under the spotlight and hounded in HS (it was so bad UC had to hire a body guard for her when she went to most meets). So in a way her talent has been both a blessing and a curse for her.
Yes she can do and race as she wants but that does not mean we fans cannot wish to she her on the track more often
NBC is going to have a tough task hyping her up if she stays on the sideline until Trials. Will she run at Pre, a Nike meet? Or just be there to give an interview? Imagine flying to Eugene just to talk to Lewis Johnson coming from a commercial break.
An athlete can race when they want but it's not good for the sport for her (and Athing) to not race then make the national team and win Worlds and Olympics.
We can't make them race. I suppose they can come up with some minimum number of races to be eligible (kind of like in NY State you need 6 races before Sectionals/State Qualifiers to eligible.
But these are pros and they do what their coach thinks is best for them.
Maybe sponsorship will dry up? Who's out there more- Femke or Sydney?
I do find myself cheering for others to beat her.
She and Mu can leave the sport and no one will notice.
I saw this video on Utoob, then partway through realized it was CBN as it got religious. Fine for anyone to be religious and to talk about it. I turned it off because I think religion should be mostly private. But good for her if it makes her happy.
Femke Bol is a rock star. I love watching her race.
I love watching both Femke and Sydney race, but Sydney's so rarely on the track, in contrast to Femke who truly seems to love racing, which really makes her a relatively uninteresting athlete to follow. Obviously, she brings it in the big races, but I just don't see the same love of competition there (for me, it feels like Sydney is racing against herself and the records vs her competitors). I have just grown to enjoy watching Femke, who comes across as such a joyous, positive person, which stands as such a contrast to the more reserved Sydney.
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