NYC Olympic Marathon Trials Marketing Questions

if they want it to be highly attended, why does it start at 7:30am? granted, shutting down streets in nyc, even if it's just in central park, is a pain in the ass, probably minimized by the early start. conditions are probably better at 7:30am. but plain and simple you're NOT going to get the average person out to watch it at that hour. people sleep in on saturday/ go out to happy hour/happier hour hour on friday and recover on saturday morning.

why not have a special start for the trials qualifiers at the start of the real new york marathon the next day? start them with the elites, or give them a 30 minute head start if you don't want foreign elites dictating the pace of our marathon trials. you already have a shitload of fans coming out on sunday, why not take advantage of that? you don't even have to promote it as much because people already come out. this is definitely the better way to go - people won't come out to watch two marathons on two consecutive days.

another point that makes me salty on the whole idea: i'm a high school xc coach in jersey and have a good friend running in the trials, but we have our first round of the state meets on that saturday morning so i can't go.

USOC, talk to them, they dictated everything about the trials except that NBC controls the where the start is, the finish etc

Team Trials, for every sport except the State Farm Skating Championships, which was basically the selection meet for the 2006 Winter Olympic Games, it's a joke.....USATF only wishes that they could market the Skating Championships as our "Team Trials"

Logos for the event, limited, basically USOC makes every decision in the process, Go's to USOC for approval, then USATF has to wait for the process, before the NYRR are told what is happening.....a major cluster f*** starting at the top

NO Sponsors, you would think the USOC would want sponsors for the event, but they don't really care as the give USATF millions and control all the rules on it. As long as NBC keeps paying Billions for the Olympic Games, you might never see another sponsor at the Team Trials, marathon or T+F, but the Men's 50km has a sponsor.....good for them

it's very frustrating loving our sport and living in the USA

Don't forget to use the proper term for the race "US Olympic Team Trials- Men's Marathon" or they might throw your butt into the street or worse make you watch The View.

It's been called "US Olympic Team Trials- Men's Marathon" since at least 1996. USOC's call I assume, as it's technically their event (one you use the word "Olympics"). They must have a former German military quartermaster naming events.

BTW, someone asked...acc. to the NYRR's website: "The race will also be streamed in its entirety at NBCSports.com..."

http://www.nyrr.org/races/pro/mens_trials/media_fact_sheet.asp

Weary wrote:

That "US Olympic Team Trials - Men's Marathon" is what USATF calls it...maybe it even comes down from USOC. I notice the NYRR insists on using it in all their literature and releases and their own magazine even though no actual fan of the sport - or more importantly, potential fan - is ever going to use that cumbersome construction.

NYRR also consistently called it the "NYC Half Marathon Presented by Nike." The last 3 words were ALWAYS used, even in quotes from athletes who obviously didn't speak them every time they referred to the race. It's all PR PC.

The first thing I thought of when I saw that ad on the subway was: didn't someone, at some point, step back, look at the poster and think.... hmmm, perhaps we shouldn't make the design look like the Twin Towers burning.... I'm just saying...

The race starts on 50th street and runs through Times Square before heading up to the park. They are doing a lot more than shutting down CP. They are shutting down Times Square, which is probably a large part of why it's at 7:30am.

Because the Trials course is a criterium style course, which can't be achieved while running through 5 boroughs.

T-man wrote:

another point that makes me salty on the whole idea: i'm a high school xc coach in jersey and have a good friend running in the trials, but we have our first round of the state meets on that saturday morning so i can't go.

However, THIS is inexcusable. I can't believe they didn't take your schedule into account while planning this event.

Victah,

I am convinced that if the NYRR had more control about how to run this event, things would be different. I'd like to see USOC relax some of these restrictions, because the truth is our sport has been on life support and now is only starting to regain a pulse. We need sponsors, we need more fan interest, we need added TV and documentary coverage. We can not have this interest without opening the doors to advertisers, sponsors, film producers (especially film producers) and relaxing binding restrictions.

Let's face it, the Olympic Marathon Trials could be compelling TV if done appropriately. The reason that we won't be able to watch it is because the cost to benefit ratio for NBC is minimal (2 marathons live in 2 days) for a sport that is less commercially popular than bowling.

How do we change this???

1. Welcome advertisers with open arms for the sake of athletes (mind you only the top athletes can even sustain themselves financially in this sport). One of the reasons that advertising is limited is they would have to go through Olympic Licencing etc. ( lets relax these restrictions)

2.Let us loosen broadcasting restrictions. If NBC won't show it live, let some other entity give our athletes exposure on live television. (NBC has exclusive Olympic broadcasting rights but won't show the race live.) Does that strike anyone else as crazy. Its like a father with two sons giving his older son a candy bar, and the son saying " I have the right to eat the candy bar, but I choose not to, I want to hold on to it. I might take a bite out of it tomorrow, but I really don't even care for this type of candy bar. The younger brother wants the candy bar and would eat the candy bar if it was given to him. It would make sense for the older brother to say, since I'm not eating the damn candy bar, why don't you take it" In the end, the athletes don't get live coverage and our sport loses out because NBC gets to keep the damn candy bar even though they have no intention of eating it.

3. In the age of web, video, and different broadcasting options that could open our athletes to different advertisers, sponsors, and financial reimbursement, allow these mediums to exist without severely restricting them. Wouldn't it be great if Flocasts had access to the World Championship Races and olympic races...Wouldn't it be great if our runners got enough exposure that they would not be running for just Shoe companies, but also garner corporate sponsorship because the athletes would have more media exposure.. Could you imagine our top athletes, like race car drivers wearing several corporate logos aside from Nike, Reebok etc. Some might argue then that we would be going too commercial. I say Why Not? Let's bring more $ into our sport, the only way to do this is to let all kinds of media into the biggest stages of our sport.

NYRR understands how to promote our sport, but I feel that there is a disconnect between some our Athletics governing bodies and what is best for the athletes.

Running is the biggest participatory sport in the country with the least popularity (That is crazy!!)...I'll be in NYC for the trials, but if I was home watching television on November 3rd, I guess I might be tuning in to Fox Sports Networks production of the American Snowmobilers TV show (FSN at 8:00 A.M. for all those interested). I guess snowmobiling does it right!

With reference to the blog linked at the top of the thread, I think marketing a few key athletes will go a long way. The "Keeping Up with the Gouchers" thing has gotten some press - if you identify the right athletes/personalities it will get people talking. Buzz will get those athletes invitations to the ESPYs or mentioned on PTI after a strong international performance - not that I am an ESPN acolyte, but that network is the path to the pinnacle of exposure in sport. Americans can't care about athletes they don't know from Adam - if our sport markets its athletes, increased audiences will follow, giving rise to greater sponsorships, which will dictate bigger prize purses, more TV coverage, and around and around.

ESPN is having a 1hr feature on Macharia Yuot, who became a US Citizen within the last year and will be running at the trials. It doesn't seem like a coincidence that it's being televised just a few days before the Trials (Oct. 30th). The DIII Trackshark blog just posted the press release:

http://www.trackshark.com/blogs/division3blog/

Because the Trials course is a criterium style course, which can't be achieved while running through 5 boroughs

but it didn't have to be.

The OT could have started before the regular NYC marathon.

MarathonMind wrote:

but it didn't have to be.

The OT could have started before the regular NYC marathon.

Are you sure? Since they last several trials have been criterium style, it makes me think it's a USATF requirement.

Ha-ha! Good one, Tex. You really should run some of your material by Conan while you're in the studio. Seriously, I think they might run with (pun intended, if that in fact was a pun) your sign idea. Make one and bring it. They have scouts that scour the crowd, looking for interesting people to include in some bits on the show, if they're planning on doing something interactive anyway. Plus, they're gonna wanna see what your sign says and why you're bringing it in the first place. Just splain it to 'em. They may let you bring it in, may not. Do us proud, Tex!

PS: They keep it cold in the studio. Bring a sweater.

I think the main point to take away from that blog post was:

"Every type of contest is more exciting if you care who wins or loses."

In my opinion, people will watch just about anything as long as they have invested emotional interest in it.

What I don't understand is that HBO Real Sports finds Lopez Lomong interesting enough to interview. The thing on Yuot is coming out on a major cable network. If there are so clearly worthy stories out there in the field, why don't we get more coverage of the races themselves? Why is running only fit to provide human-interest stories? Especially given that, I don't know, one of our guys won a silver in the last Olympics... which pretty much suggests that we have at least a contender for the gold in 2008. Oh yeah - that guy has a pretty interesting back-story, too!

I write for NYRR. We were required by the deal with Nike to call the race by its full name, including the curious all-caps on "NIKE." I put the last three words in brackets when I could if someone was being quoted, because of course no one would say that aloud. It's similar with the name of the Trials race: That bulky construction gets in the way of easy reading, but we don't have any say about it. It happens a lot--it's invariably the "ING New York City Marathon 2007," "the Flora London Marathon," et al.--and how about "the real,- Berlin Marathon" [no typos]? My use of the NYC Marathon's name above has probably been double-underlined for an ad link, too; that looks even weirder. But these slightly awkward phrasings don't seem very important when they're attached to serious financial backing for world-class races. I've never liked seeing the names of big hospital donors in huge letters across the new buldings that they've endowed, either, but you can't get too upset about the better hospitals.

I have been saying this would happen since New York was selected to host the trials. There was so much potential to make this the greatest trials ever. Instead they piggyback the New York marathon on a separate course. Since the athletes will not be running the traditional course on the "marathon day" the trials have become nothing more then a side show! Quite frankly more people will go and watch the "REAL" marathon that is on Sunday.

I agree with Wejo 100%, it is easy to market. 4 years, one dream, three spots... We should have background stories before the marathon, a pre-show where you get to know the athletes. If this was done right it would not be a problem and could have been the best trials ever.

My major criticism was always that the US trials were not running the New York marathon course and was told it was because of sponsorship issues. If this were true then why is ING on the advertisement banners as Wejo said?

The ball has been dropped and despite having the best marathon field in the history of our sport the race is being put on with little more organization then a Junior High Cross Country meet. The USATF and NYRR should be ashamed of how little effort they have put into this. Where is all media and hype the promised? It is in the green that is lining their pockets.

This self-serving behavior is exactly why our sport is on TV less then poker, billiards, ping pong, etc. USATF get your head out of your asses!!!

Snoochie Boochie wrote:

The ball has been dropped and despite having the best marathon field in the history of our sport the race is being put on with little more organization then a Junior High Cross Country meet. The USATF and NYRR should be ashamed of how little effort they have put into this. Where is all media and hype the promised? It is in the green that is lining their pockets.

I'm still with-holding my final judgment of their efforts until after the events, as I have my fingers-crossed that we will see a blitz in the weekend prior (this coming one) and the week leading up to it. I mean, the race starts in Midtown, and it's on a morning show, so I have to think we're going to see more promotion than the standard ads that they would do for the Marathon year-to-year anyway, which -- along with ChasingGlory -- is all we've seen thus far.