Please - established brand, last shot, relatively new mother, story of perseverance, and on and on. Have you never watched network sports coverage before, especially of the Olympics and related events like the trials? It's all feel-good, sugary "human interest" stories like this. If there's an angle, they'll find it. And while hardcore track fans on Letsrun don't care, casual track fans and causal Olympics fans generally eat this stuff up.
I'm not saying I agree, but I understand and am hardly perplexed by the coverage.