Why isn't running glorified like other sports?

It's the worst spectator sport. Especially track. Diamond league is trying to address some of those issues fortunately.

It was hugely popular in the 60s and 70's, even in the USA. In the UK it was at least as popular as sports like tennis.

Then along came legions of doped up Africans. This only appeals to a strange type of person, and just about every one of them on the planet can be found on this tiny toxic forum.

Think of the major films that were made about running in that period. The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, Chariots Of Fire, the film with Michael Crawford (who was a big star in the UK at the time) breaking 2 hours for the marathon.

When was the last running movie made? Track is about 1/100th as popular in the UK/Europe today as it was 40 years ago. That could change now that testing in Africa is a thing and there is an inevitable explosion of talent outside of Africa happening in its wake.

Coevett wrote:

It was hugely popular in the 60s and 70's, even in the USA. In the UK it was at least as popular as sports like tennis.

Then along came legions of doped up Africans. This only appeals to a strange type of person, and just about every one of them on the planet can be found on this tiny toxic forum.

What else has increased in popularity since the 60s and 70s?

NBA, NFL, college football....

It's all about that entertainment dollar. People will sit and watch NASCAR, which is no more exciting than track, for hours!

If you can drink a beer and enjoy it people will watch.

When your ultimate competition is the Olympics then your sport is second tier.

Individual sports are only popular in the US when a US player is dominant....golf...tennis...etc.

Alan

The advent of technology and to a lesser extant obesity has driven down the respect of running and pedestrianism. 150 years ago it was all the rave. Gambling, and front page news. In another 150 years running will be obsolete.

The people saying it's boring or mainly for participants are WRONG!!! It's "boring" because the olympics ruined it with stupid formats, and 99% of the "participants" can't even do it right.

Here's what the olympics made stupid:

) too many events at too many distances.

) glory event is only once every 4 years

) 1500m is a stupid relic of the failed 500m track experiment. Doesn't resonate!

) team competition does NOT work

) hurdles is not a real pure athletic skill

) discus is not a real pure athletic skill

) triple jump is especially not a real pure athletic skill

) pole vault is neat but, come on, it's still ^^^

) high jump is not a ^^^ unless you're landing on your feet.

Nobody's interested in this 19th century baloney. At this point it's just a niche school tradition and the niche-loving cowards refuse to give it up. If they ever braven up, here's the fix:

) No teams. Leaderboard! Like golf. Everyone's times recorded officially in a worldwide individual ranking.

) fewer events: 100, 400, 800, 1600 on the track. That's all! Road: 5k, 10k, half marathon, full marathon.

) end the silly spectacle of indoor track. Your team can travel? Great, go to LA or Texas and race there.

) no heats. It's not a 3-rep contest!!! The leaderboard top 8 meet in the world championship, except 12 for the 1600. And said championship takes only 1 day to complete, like the Super Bowl.

runbeast wrote:

I don't understand the world glorifies sports with balls especially in America, why isn't running glorified as much, it's the most mental, physically exhausting sport there is, no breaks, no relying on teammates, multiple events to specialize in based on your genetics unlike most sports, it's just so pure nothing and beautiful.

Who cares how well your dribble, throw, kick, nothing surpasses the old classic race of champions!

They tried it before, remember.

Once upon a time... Godwin’s Law.

This is why we can’t have nice things.

Because everyone can do it. It's not a difficult skill.

Hitting a home run. Throwing a 100 mph fastball. Throwing a football 70 yards. Skating and scoring a goal. All difficult tasks to the average person.

Too much metric system, it’s confounding.

Team handball, korfball, cricket, volleyball, field hockey, lacrosse, hurling, squash, table tennis, water polo, polo, Jai alai, kickball, bowling, broomball, croquet, rugby, ...

there are a lot of ball sports that are not particularly popular in the US. Some are very popular in other countries and some wax and wane in their popularity.

Different people like different stuff and some things are more popular than other things. There's not always an answer to "why".

runbeast wrote:

I don't understand the world glorifies sports with balls especially in America, why isn't running glorified as much, it's the most mental, physically exhausting sport there is, no breaks, no relying on teammates, multiple events to specialize in based on your genetics unlike most sports, it's just so pure nothing and beautiful.

Who cares how well your dribble, throw, kick, nothing surpasses the old classic race of champions!

Oh my 🌸 sweet love of old

krispy kremlin._._._._. wrote:

1. It's kind of boring

2. It doesn't allow gambling (game changer)

3. Many meets don't have beer/garden

4. For the common person, it is very difficult to run regularly; other sports they can at least think back to a time when they were in 6th grade playing rec-basketball and pretend like that makes the NBA more relatable.

You can gamble in uk. Used to be hard to place a bet because its just not covered like other events. Olympics World champs and big races like London are covered. Lower down not so much

Used to be good as bookies and pundits not clued up

Bolt set world record on a wet track and was favourite for Olympics. Shortly after Gay pulled a h/s . I missed placing the bet straight away. The day after Gay was out and the odds did not budge and I got the same odds.

betfair the way to go if you can get on. Of course in America you can own a gun but not place a bet or have a drink if you are young!

I like track just the way it is. It seems like you should find some other sports to follow.

Just Another Hobby Jogger wrote:

Most people get excited about sports when it's their school, city or country against "them."

That's why track is glorified during the Olympics, but not any other time.

And we have a winner.

People like to have teams to root for or against. At LetsRun we try to let you know the runners so you can root for or against someone but the thing with running is there is no singel winner or loser. At a team event, you go and your team wins or loses. At running, it's muddled as there are like 20 events going on at once.

And if your runner who was supposed to get7th gets third, is that a win or a loss. As a fan, it's nto the same.

But the bigger issue is there is a) no radanomness in the results or b) strategy.

In track, there is one moment when a runner gets ahead and that's almsot always it. In a team sport, it's back and forth.

nate bass wrote:

The sport on a “professional” level is a joke to the general population. No one really cares about watching people compete at something that the athletes make less than what a lot of average people could earn in a 40hr work week. The major sports have an allure about them because as kids you hear about them making millions and they are real celebrities.

The body image doesn’t help either. Men are meant to be strong. Running far doesn’t appeal to much of anyone. There’s just no real skill in it. The best runner of a friend group is probably just the one who choose to use the most free time doing it.

Post like this are really off the mark. The money thing is ridiculous. Sports that are super popular creae the money - not the reverse. And there is plenty of gambling related to running. The sport is perfecf for gambling - just like horse racing - but ti's not popular enough for it to be widespread.

And the reality is trafck and field is pretty popular. I mean it's way more popular than most sports - it's just less popular than the biggest like basketball, soccer, nfl.

Running was already in decline as a spectator sport in the 70s and 80s when the surge of drugs in the 90s further hurt fan interest, since track and field is largely a statistic-based sport. Track fans don't get excited when a long jumper jumps, they only really applaud when a great distance for a jump later flashes on the screen. Largely true for runners as well. If that time/distance is then later found to be drug facilitated, the fan is totally disillusioned. By contrast, if Tom Brady throws a clutch touchdown pass to win a football game, the fans don't really care if the linemen are all jacked up in steroids. Basketball seems little impacted by drugs. Baseball is more stat-oriented, with things like the number of home runs, and fan interest was adversely impacted for a while by guys like Barry Bonds being jacked on steroids.

as a fan, who cares where track ranks?

right now you can see the events and get the info.

its never been better.

it's a niche.

more people watching and more money in it, how's that going to improve your enjoyment?

joe sixpack and his fat wife, let them watch the lame pro sports and spoiled to the core athletes.

enjoy your running.

track and field / running fans , despite the haters (who are in the minority with a big mouth), are

the best fans and human beings, period.

be proud of yourself and your sport.

you know, rolex watches are not for everyone.

track is the rolex of sports.

you have to have class to wear it.

An average person should race in each olympic final. Problem solved. Now every spectator will see the gap between average and world class.