Athletics events to be cut from Olympics?

RayCun

http://www.theage.com.au/sport/athletics/bolt-from-the-blue-200-metres-10000-metres-and-shot-put-under-threat-at-olympics-20141210-1240lr.html

Five key events, remarkably including the 200-metre sprint, and the shot put, are in jeopardy after the IOC pushed for the athletics program to be tightened to allow other sports to be added to the Olympics schedule.

The events regarded most at risk under a athletics shake-up are, in order: the 10,000 metres, one of the men's race walks - most likely the 20-kilometre event - the 200, shot put and triple jump.

Later in the article it suggests the 10k on the track might be replaced with a road 10k, which makes some sense. But cutting these events to add stuff like baseball, surfing, golf, skateboarding...?

What is even the point? If you have the track, you can hold all the athletics events there. It's not like it saves them having to build a shot putt stadium...

sideswipe

Maybe it's a phasing out of athletics?
Most of the bad press re doping etc has been around athletics, perhaps a less athletics orientated Olympics is attractive to the top brass.

IvoryTower

the 200, the shot putt and the triple jump? that would be awful!

techdiver

Why would they need to drop track and field athletics events to make room for unrelated sports? That makes no sense!!

Zaph

I'd imagine that is more to do with other logistics like transport and the size of the athletes village.

robinph

Don't see how it saves them anything that would then allow other events to take place. Dropping the 200 doesn't even free you up any rooms in the athletes village as most of them will be running in other distances, dropping the relays would get rid of more athletes needing beds.
Dropping the shot doesn't save any time in the schedule as it's not like it even gets in the way of other field events going on at the same time. Same for the triple jump as it's not like the sand pits are in use all the time during the week by multi sports and the long jumpers.

Dropping the 10000 may save a couple of hours from the schedule that you can run other distances on the track, so could potentially shuffle things around and then get rid of one of the half days of sessions in the stadium. A 10km on the road would be good, and allow for more free viewing in the host city which is a good thing although you'd probably need to have 2.5km laps or shorter to make it worth people turning out to watch and be entertained. You'll probably get more people out to watch the 10km than one of the walks.

Beasty

sideswipe wrote: »

Maybe it's a phasing out of athletics?
Most of the bad press re doping etc has been around athletics, perhaps a less athletics orientated Olympics is attractive to the top brass.

Of course it's not going to be phased out. However you need to recognise Athletics and Swimming get a vastly disproportionate amount of Olympics time/coverage than other sports (which have already been squeezed as they add extra events). So for example there used to be 12 track cycling medals, but now only 10 (making way for 2 BMX medals), with certain events now only reaching a pinnacle at World Championships.

I would imagine as they try to monetise the Olympics by expanding into other events the main "slack" there is to squeeze medals out of current events is going to be in Athletics and Swimming

sideswipe

Beasty wrote: »

Of course it's not going to be phased out.

I would imagine as they try to monetise the Olympics by expanding into other events the main "slack" there is to squeeze medals out of current events is going to be in Athletics and Swimming

I know, sounds ludicrous right, but I wouldn't be so sure- we are at the point where the 4 years between Olympics is spent taking medals away.
With regards money- there are plenty of very lucrative sports that could be added that would more than make up for no athletics.

RayCun

Athletics gets more coverage at the Olympics because it is one of the core Olympic sports, and the Olympics is the highpoint of the athletics calendar.
Same with gymnastics, for example.

Throughout the Olympics, there are multiple events on at the same time. Broadcasters already choose what to cover, and viewers choose what to watch.

It's not like there is a huge pent-up demand from viewers to watch Olympic skateboarding...

Djoucer

I thought the 50km race walk was the most likely to be cut.

Tough for athletes. Hasn't got a good rep of late. Dopers etc. More recently, slow motion replays have a made a bit of a joke of the rules.

Read recently that race walking community don't particularly welcome the spotlight of the Olympics given the ridicule it receives.

walshb

Maybe they have to make way for real sports like darts and snooker!

TheQuietFella

I can only think they want to appeal to a greater audience by dropping some
events and introducing others. Soccer, tennis, golf I think have been added in recent years. Skate-boarding, surfing, sport climbing have been added for 2020!

I lost all interest in the major sporting events due to the level of doping involved.
Couldn't take it seriously anymore. Loved Tour De France and athletics but all a con!

RacoonQueen

RayCun wrote: »

http://www.theage.com.au/sport/athletics/bolt-from-the-blue-200-metres-10000-metres-and-shot-put-under-threat-at-olympics-20141210-1240lr.html



Later in the article it suggests the 10k on the track might be replaced with a road 10k, which makes some sense. But cutting these events to add stuff like baseball, surfing, golf, skateboarding...?

What is even the point? If you have the track, you can hold all the athletics events there. It's not like it saves them having to build a shot putt stadium...

They'd be better off cutting things like golf and soccer that most of the players in those sports probably don't really care about doing in the olympics (see the amount of golfers that dropped out)...and drop boxing, since boxing was probably the biggest joke of the Rio Olympics

robinph

Article is from 2014.

walshb

RacoonQueen wrote: »

since boxing was probably the biggest joke of the Rio Olympics

An absolute nonsense statement. Made by reading too much social media BS. One of the best tournaments there has been.

Boxing is as equal to athletics as being the heartbeat of the games.

RayCun

robinph wrote: »

Article is from 2014.

:pac:

I didn't notice that! It just came up on my facebook feed, I assumed it was current

Next you'll tell me it's from 01/04/14!

RacoonQueen

walshb wrote: »

An absolute nonsense statement. Made by reading too much social media BS. One of the best tournaments there has been.

Boxing is as equal to athletics as being the heartbeat of the games.

...or from someone who watched boxing at the Olympics and formed an opinion on it. Though it doesn't surprise me that you would find something to disagree with here.

Quite interesting looking at the events of the first modern olympic games - funnily enough, probably the ones I'd be most interested in and would watch if they came on...a couple more I'd add here, but that's just me. Be interesting to know what value many of the other athletes of some sports hold to the Olympics
https://www.olympic.org/athens-1896

walshb

RacoonQueen wrote: »

...or from someone who watched boxing at the Olympics and formed an opinion on it. Though it doesn't surprise me that you would find something to disagree with here.

Quite interesting looking at the events of the first modern olympic games - funnily enough, probably the ones I'd be most interested in and would watch if they came on...a couple more I'd add here, but that's just me. Be interesting to know what value many of the other athletes of some sports hold to the Olympics
https://www.olympic.org/athens-1896

So go explain the joke that was boxing in Rio. Throwing out comments with no substance does your argument no favors. I disagreed with your substance-less comment. It was just too easy not to.

There were over 250 fights in Rio as far as I know....

Chivito550

RacoonQueen wrote: »

...or from someone who watched boxing at the Olympics and formed an opinion on it. Though it doesn't surprise me that you would find something to disagree with here.

Quite interesting looking at the events of the first modern olympic games - funnily enough, probably the ones I'd be most interested in and would watch if they came on...a couple more I'd add here, but that's just me. Be interesting to know what value many of the other athletes of some sports hold to the Olympics
https://www.olympic.org/athens-1896

He's a boxer to be fair, so can't exactly blame him for disagreeing.

Boxing has a long history in the Games and is one of the core sports. Rio was a sham though regarding the Conlon fight, and something needs to be done quickly or people will just turn away. I didn't watch a single fight after Conlon's defeat. I couldn't bring myself to watch something which was so clearly corrupt. There needs to be an appeal system in place. If there was, that ridiculous decision would never have stood up.

Regarding the article, it is well old. The idea of cutting events from athletics has zero to do with doping. Any chance for people to have a sly dig at that. IOC try to keep a set number of medal events, and to add joke sports like skateboarding, they need to cut events from elsewhere. 200m and 10000m are easy targets as those who run those can run 100m, 400m and 5000m. It probably won't happen anyway. The Olympics needs athletics, so it won't do anything too drastic. Swimming is the sport with a disproportionate number of medals. Too many events of similar distances. When you've got people winning 4,5,6 medals in a single week it is clear that there are far too many similar events, and far too many events relative to the numbers who compete globally.

ThisRegard

robinph wrote: »

Article is from 2014.

I do remember reading it some time ago, I thought this thread was a follow on from the initial proposals.

walshb

Chivito550 wrote: »

He's a boxer to be fair, so can't exactly blame him for disagreeing.

Boxing has a long history in the Games and is one of the core sports. Rio was a sham though regarding the Conlon fight, and something needs to be done quickly or people will just turn away. I didn't watch a single fight after Conlon's defeat. I couldn't bring myself to watch something which was so clearly corrupt. There needs to be an appeal system in place. If there was, that ridiculous decision would never have stood up.

Regarding the article, it is well old. The idea of cutting events from athletics has zero to do with doping. Any chance for people to have a sly dig at that. IOC try to keep a set number of medal events, and to add joke sports like skateboarding, they need to cut events from elsewhere. 200m and 10000m are easy targets as those who run those can run 100m, 400m and 5000m. It probably won't happen anyway. The Olympics needs athletics, so it won't do anything too drastic. Swimming is the sport with a disproportionate number of medals. Too many events of similar distances. When you've got people winning 4,5,6 medals in a single week it is clear that there are far too many similar events, and far too many events relative to the numbers who compete globally.

Nothing to do with boxing being my sport.

One fight you are basing it being a sham on? A 3-0 unanimous win. BTW, I gave the fight to MC, but I have seen far more dubious decisions. The fight was closer than many think. His rant after it is what people remember, and from that they extrapolate that the sport in Rio was a joke-bent. Utter garbage, but to be expected in this fickle world of social media.

Of the 250 or so fights a very small amount were looked at. That is no different to any tournament anywhere in history. I have judged at many, and seen mostly the correct winner getting the verdict. The sport is, after-all very subjective. The standard of officiating in Rio across the whole tournament saws very good. But don't let facts stand in the way of social media ranting.

Chivito550

walshb wrote: »

Nothing to do with boxing being my sport.

One fight you are basing it being a sham on? A 3-0 unanimous win. BTW, I gave the fight to MC, but I have seen far more dubious decisions. The fight was closer than many think. His rant after it is what people remember, and from that they extrapolate that the sport in Rio was a joke-bent. Utter garbage, but to be expected in this fickle world of social media.

Of the 250 or so fights a very small amount were looked at. That is no different to any tournament anywhere in history. I have judged at many, and seen mostly the correct winner getting the verdict. The sport is, after-all very subjective. The standard of officiating in Rio across the whole tournament saws very good. But don't let facts stand in the way of social media ranting.

If only a small number of decisions are ever wrong then why not have an appeals system in place for the ones that were clearly not right? There was such a system in London and I recall a Japanese boxer getting screwed and the result was overturned. How come there's no appeals system anymore? How can a sport not have an appeals system in place. You can't blame people for being cynical when there is literally no avenue to appeal a decision.

adrian522

Personally I'd rather see them add a HM then a road 10k. I think all the current track events should stay, I don't see any logic in dropping any of them.

If they are looking to cut medals it should be from sports where the Olympics is not the pinnacle of the sport. Sports like Golf, Tennis, Soccer, Road cycling etc all have much bigger events in their calendar than the Olympic Games.

walshb

Chivito550 wrote: »

If only a small number of decisions are ever wrong then why not have an appeals system in place for the ones that were clearly not right? There was such a system in London and I recall a Japanese boxer getting screwed and the result was overturned. How come there's no appeals system anymore? How can a sport not have an appeals system in place. You can't blame people for being cynical when there is literally no avenue to appeal a decision.

But what is your point?

The rules are in place. End of. The sport was far from a joke in Rio.The actual joke was people buying into the hysterics being spouted on social media.

London a boxing verdict getting overturned? It was not for a "bad" decision. You can overturn for an incorrect decision due to human error or systems error. But not for the result being the result when the systems work. If an official broke a rule (deliberately or not deliberately) or made a systems mistake that can be looked at.

In a nutshell the whole Rio tournament was a big success. All that noise made over a very small amount of verdicts doesn't change that fact. I have been at many tournaments where words like robbery and corruption are bandied about regarding very hard and close fought fights. This is a bad reflection on the people throwing the words around. Pure sore losers.

hot buttered scones

It looks like the 50k walk might be for the chop. From Rob Heffernan's Facebook page:

With the Olympic Games happening again in just over 3 years and the work gone in to building my academy and Hp structures in Cork Athletics Ireland have to do everything in their power to make sure this does now happen. This profile of a 50km racewalker can be so different to a 20km racewalker and this decision can end so many athletes careers who have already committed to this Olympic cycle . Let's not allow this to happen!!

Irish times from Wednesday:

https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/other-sports/50km-race-walk-could-be-removed-from-athletics-programme-1.3038020?mode=amp

Beasty

RayCun wrote: »

Athletics gets more coverage at the Olympics because it is one of the core Olympic sports, and the Olympics is the highpoint of the athletics calendar.
Same with gymnastics, for example.

Throughout the Olympics, there are multiple events on at the same time. Broadcasters already choose what to cover, and viewers choose what to watch.

It's not like there is a huge pent-up demand from viewers to watch Olympic skateboarding...

I accept it's one of the core events. Equally so Swimming where the potential for individual athletes to get multiple medals in a single Olympics is, in my view, absurd.

However there does seem to be limits on medals and participants in each Olympics, and as they look to grow them more by expanding into other sports the obvious places to look for cuts are going to be the 2 sports which still do have a completely disproportionate amount of medals

I am not a fan of including any sport that does not treat the Olympics as the pinnacle, and without doubt it is and will remain the pinnacle for those 2 sports I do mention. I would prefer the likes of Tennis, Soccer (which has actually been there pretty much from the start, but only recently opened up to the professional game), Golf, Baseball and the like never considered for any Olympics. Alas that's not the way the IOC works though and they will continue to look at ways at grabbing pieces of the action in all areas where they think they could make a few more quid

Basketball is a good example of a sport that worked very well at an amateur level, but as soon as money became the main driver for the IOC it was always going to find ways of getting NBA players involved. Likewise Boxing which in Rio opened up to professionals. That all suits the American audience who ultimately seem to have more of a say than anyone. It may change if Trump takes the country into more of an isolationist/protectionist state and countries like China open up more. Just wait for the clamour for more Table Tennis medals...

In my view the IOC will slowly kill the goose that lays the golden egg with this approach, but unfortunately all sport suffers from the short termism we see around us all the time across pretty much every walk of life.

Chivito550

Beasty wrote: »

I accept it's one of the core events. Equally so Swimming where the potential for individual athletes to get multiple medals in a single Olympics is, in my view, absurd.

However there does seem to be limits on medals and participants in each Olympics, and as they look to grow them more by expanding into other sports the obvious places to look for cuts are going to be the 2 sports which still do have a completely disproportionate amount of medals

I am not a fan of including any sport that does not treat the Olympics as the pinnacle, and without doubt it is and will remain the pinnacle for those 2 sports I do mention. I would prefer the likes of Tennis, Soccer (which has actually been there pretty much from the start, but only recently opened up to the professional game), Golf, Baseball and the like never considered for any Olympics. Alas that's not the way the IOC works though and they will continue to look at ways at grabbing pieces of the action in all areas where they think they could make a few more quid

Basketball is a good example of a sport that worked very well at an amateur level, but as soon as money became the main driver for the IOC it was always going to find ways of getting NBA players involved. Likewise Boxing which in Rio opened up to professionals. That all suits the American audience who ultimately seem to have more of a say than anyone. It may change if Trump takes the country into more of an isolationist/protectionist state and countries like China open up more. Just wait for the clamour for more Table Tennis medals...

In my view the IOC will slowly kill the goose that lays the golden egg with this approach, but unfortunately all sport suffers from the short termism we see around us all the time across pretty much every walk of life.

Sorry but that's pure rubbish that athletics has a disproportionate number of medals. The disciplines are so different from each other that it is very hard to win more than 2 medals in a single games, and for many one is all they can go for. Every field event is specific. Nobody competes in more than one throw, or more than one jump. Hurdles is the same. In terms of running, you can attempt a double, but outside of 100/200 and 5000/10000 success is rare. For most athletes in athletics, you have one, and only one chance at glory.

To compare it to swimming where most distances are 100, 200 and 400 and where swimmers rack up obscene numbers of medals, is so far off the mark.

robinph

The IAAF has 47 medal events, compared to FINA with 46 (although only 32 of those will be swimming up and down in the pool).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympic_sports#Current_and_discontinued_summer_program

Wrestling, Cycling and Gymnastics would be next on the list with 18 events each.


Why is there an odd number of athletics events still, since they added the female pole vault it should be an even number surely?

hot buttered scones

robinph wrote: »

The IAAF has 47 medal events, compared to FINA with 46 (although only 32 of those will be swimming up and down in the pool).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympic_sports#Current_and_discontinued_summer_program

Wrestling, Cycling and Gymnastics would be next on the list with 18 events each.


Why is there an odd number of athletics events still, since they added the female pole vault it should be an even number surely?

There's no female 50k walk maybe?

walshb

The 50 k walk is a bizarre one....Absolute no need/want for it.

Losing the triple jump is for me the most damning!

RayCun

robinph wrote: »

Why is there an odd number of athletics events still, since they added the female pole vault it should be an even number surely?

The 50k walk