Why Flotrack is Killing our Sport

Can't blame people for trying to make money after they paid something for the rights. But I think there is no doubt that the absence of a free stream destroyed any semblance of a Penn Relays discussion on these boards ...I came here around the time of the college DMR and couldn't find any discussion. Maybe their strategy will work and enough diehards will capitulate and buy it. But it is killing the real time discussion of events. Will Stanford be the same?

Disappointed in Flotrack wrote:

NO HIGH SCHOOL OR COLLEGE ATHLETE SHOULD BE PAYING 100+ DOLLARS A YEAR TO WATCH THEIR OWN RACES.

I agree with this statement entirely. I was once a person who had an insatiable desire to promote track & field and distance running in this great country of ours. Unfortunately there's no way around the pay walls for a company like FloTrack who has multiple mouths to feed and made some awful business acquisitions.

This niche has learned time and time again that site heads should not expand too quickly nor can they rely on anything consistent from advertising platforms such as Google AdSense.

It takes a decent quantity of page views per day to generate $20 of advertising revenue. How does one keep generating user page views day-to-day? New content. How does new content appear on a website? Work.

If a work input of 5 hours == $20 of advertising output for the day, does it make sense? No it doesn't.

Unfortunately, running is not interesting to the populations beyond the core user base here and the user base is essentially worthless. Small disposable incomes == no clicks on advertisements that lead to sales == no big time revenue for website publishers.

This is the conundrum and the sport's coverage is on thin ice.

No. It is the Penn Relays that are killing the sport. They did not have to agree to such a broadcast deal with flotrack.

You could pay for a month and then cancel. They have a monthly plan for 19.99/mo. I think. It might be cheaper than seeing it live. There's only a few meets a year I would relly be willing to pay for, but Penn is one, and you might get a few other meets during the month as well.

A pair of running shoes runs close to a year of Flotrack pro.

A major league baseball game - counting tickets, parking, and snacks - will cost about a year.

$10 per month does not seem excessive to have the videos to these events.

By the way, the quality of Flotrack's work is much improved over what they had going when free.

To be honest, I'd like for Flotrack to be cheaper and make a profit by getting more customers to sign up. I hope that Flotrack tries to provide a few more flexible options - maybe $1.99 for a particular meet or $1.00 for a particular race. I dunno - a way to get someone who doesn't want to spend $20 on watching the one race he's interested in.

It'd be a shame if someone ripped those videos and put them up on Youtube.

I think what flotrack does is very good. I can't afford flotrack pro at the moment, but when I can I'll get it. I used to have it, and it was very good.

And remember they are bring excellent coverage of the sport that others won't provide. The Driven and Inside series are great, you get to learn about the athletes. In the Driven you basically get to see a day in the life of a pro distance runner.

And the workout wednesdays are great too, actually getting to see what the pros do. Although always gotta remind yourself to put the workout in the video in context of where they're at in the season.

Then the live races are awesome, I love watching races live. That way I know the result as soon as it happens which is awesome, plus I can't get it spoiled by going on the internet or having a friend text me the result.

Maybe I'm not that big of a track fan, but i will not pay $20 bucks just to see a couple of races on crappy shaky footage. I guess little by little I'll just lose interest in the sport and only pay attention during the Olympics like the majority of America does. Nothing lost really. Track and Field is dying because the only ones willing to cover events want to create a monopoly on the sport and charge an arm and a leg to show the coverage. I refuse to participate in this BS. If what's left of the sport in the US dies, so be it. Track is not that great of a sport anyway. Time to switch over to basketball or football. I don't pay anything to watch my college team or pro-team on TV or the internet.

Flotrack is still trying to hype their pro and have more people try it. So, after they simmer down and settle with the number of Pro users / awareness of Pro, they'll probably offer meets without signing up for it all. But they won't be cheap, else the Pro users will not renew and opt for just paying for big meets. I see $10-$15 per meet.

I'll offer the counterpoint to pretty much everyone on LRC. I have flotrack pro. I really enjoy it. In my mind, it is well worth the money (I have a yearly membership, so it's $12/month, not $20). The driven videos were excellent, and the entire kenya series they just released is worth watching many times. I will not be cancelling FTP any time soon.

STOP CRYING AND GET A JOB POOR BOY.

Just make the damn videos free, holy. If Runnerspace were smart they would take advantage of Flotracks stupid logic. They truly are killing the sport. Parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents, all want to see their relatives run in these races. I guess they have to pay to do it too? Ridiculous.

On the other side of that, I have a FloPro account and had my entire team watch their peers run the 4x4 at Penn, all together, on a projection screen in school. It was a huge bonding moment for the team to all be together and cheer on their team when they couldn't be there.

I'd like to think that helped bring the sport to life in otherwise semi-interested kids..

There is nothing wrong with having to pay for content. You pay for cable to watch TV, you pay for certain media sites' content. I pay for ESPN Insider, which is only a few dollars a month, but well worth it for the additional content I get. The problem with FloPro is that you get sub-par announcing and camera work for way too much. Their featured video stuff is solid, and worth paying for, but not what they ask. Same goes for viewing their live events. I agree with a few others posters here...I am caring less and less about Penn because I don't want to pay FloTrack and thus can't watch most of the meet.

Flotrack showing events isn't bad for the sport. It's like the B1G Network; people hated it at first but now they don't mind it so much. It gives options to meets that normally you couldn't see. Where Flo messed up is taking the free events and making them ppv. That, I believe, is a mistake. From what I understand some Universities like them while others hate them. Their complete unprofessionalism is what I hear most about Flotrack. I also hate their announcers. But when I watch I watch on mute. I also think they don't know what they're doing when filming these races. But, it is track and field coverage.

Count how many ads on the forum pages now at LetsRun. The total is six and seven if you count the video ad that runs before the boston marathon videos.

Harsh reality but the only way to make it without charging for content.

I stopped going to flotrack when they started charging. Their meet coverage was barely watchable before they started charging. They ruined Alan Webbs American mile record video with their HORRIBLE announcing. There's no way I'll pay for that.

I'm fine with looking at results online. All the major meets have results posted live anyways.

Disappointed in Flotrack wrote: Why Flotrack is Killing our Sport

It should be pointed out: you can't kill something that is already "dead", or that was never really "alive" in the first place . to most of the world, not including a few brief moments at the olympics, running is something you do to exercise. it's not a sport. Never was, never will be. In that sense (the sense you seem to mean it), it been dead a long time)

You guys are ridiculous. Flotrack doesn't owe you free videos.

It's a pretty good product for the low cost ($12/month).