There are too many sprints and distance events. It would be a lot more exciting to see all the best runners in the same race. I would choose a distance that everyone can meet at the middle at. Milers can move up to 10K, marathoners can move down. 100m sprinters can move up to 200m, 400m sprinters can move down.
Nah the sprints are just fine. Don’t mess with them. Do whatever you want to with the distance races.
Get rid of the 10,000m and replace it with 10k on the roads.
A race with a city backdrop is already much more entertaining than 25 laps around a track. And I'd imagine a 10k is less likely to come down to a 400m race. It'll separate sooner than that. And no lapped runners either!
That is her opinion. The 10,000 is not my preferred event to view but have to say I greatly enjoy watching a well contested 10,000m unfold.
I think every event can be boring, and that every event can be super interesting and entertaining…
A lot of athletics fans (me f.ex) think field events can be boring (f.ex because we ourselves are into running), but man did I pay attention (to every jump) when Carl Lewis and Mike Powell both jumped close to 9m in WC 1991!
To me the 10000m has the framework to be the top event of interest; especially because of the duration (that other find boring) and history -so much to evaluate when it comes to body language, placing in the field, lead and pace efforts, and the possibility of a fast time, and the strength guys against the “kickers”…
Every event can be boring: Nearly thirty minutes of uninteresting running if the pace is “dull”, the field lack half of the best athletes, and there are nobody from your own country, and there’s no interesting rivalry or athletes to root for…
My dream scenario is this: All the Ugandans, Kenyans, Ethiopians, Americans in super form, along with two Norwegians that really can surprise (Ingebrigtsen and Nordås), and a lone Swede (Almgren) and some other guys (in progression) from Europe and other continents -a championship clash on a cool evening with a WR in the air: Man, who would call this set up boring..!
Personally I don't even know why she would admit this to a media outlet. Everyone knows how bad a place the sport is in, so for one of a nation's leading athletes to say this, is irresponsible on her part, even if she believes it. Think about the impact of what you say.
Yes if you are a casual/non-running viewer then 30mins can be a bit long but then what does that say about the Marathon? Plenty of people turn up to watch that. The dead-space is actually the lack of story lines in this, and while I and others can be critical of wave lights, it does help the casual fan. How do we solve this in marathons? Splits, decent commentary, info on athletes, etc
For the more hardcore track fans, even 5000's can be over relatively quick, I enjoy the 10,000m more than any other event because you get a good amount of sport to watch but also I personally understand just how much of a slog 25laps at a decent pace can be, let alone throwing rivals in there.
Keep the 10, make it more engaging; better coverage/commentary, better storylines, more accessible athletes, keep the wavelights, make them into proper events (like Nightof10000mPB's with music, entertainment, fireworks, etc) not just some extra long distance event that gets pegged onto the end of a full day of events. Make it EASY TO F-ING STREAM, not hidden behind some geo-locked paywall. Put in decent prize money to attract talent, heck have more of them so they are more commonly known about.
At a very basic level, people are only turning away from the 10000 because society in general now gets bored easy, wants quick results/validation and avoids harder work. Pull your pants up.
Have exactly 30 entrants. Each lap the last place runner gets removed. By the end you'll have 5 racers remaining who are very tired. ...But it won't be a jogfest.
I think sprints are boring. With the prerace introductions and showing off, getting them set in the blocks, false starts and multiple replays it takes as long to show a sprint as it does to show a distance race. Not to mention the hurdles with the time required to set up and take down the hurdles.
Personally I don't even know why she would admit this to a media outlet. Everyone knows how bad a place the sport is in, so for one of a nation's leading athletes to say this, is irresponsible on her part, even if she believes it. Think about the impact of what you say.
Yes if you are a casual/non-running viewer then 30mins can be a bit long but then what does that say about the Marathon? Plenty of people turn up to watch that. The dead-space is actually the lack of story lines in this, and while I and others can be critical of wave lights, it does help the casual fan. How do we solve this in marathons? Splits, decent commentary, info on athletes, etc
For the more hardcore track fans, even 5000's can be over relatively quick, I enjoy the 10,000m more than any other event because you get a good amount of sport to watch but also I personally understand just how much of a slog 25laps at a decent pace can be, let alone throwing rivals in there.
Keep the 10, make it more engaging; better coverage/commentary, better storylines, more accessible athletes, keep the wavelights, make them into proper events (like Nightof10000mPB's with music, entertainment, fireworks, etc) not just some extra long distance event that gets pegged onto the end of a full day of events. Make it EASY TO F-ING STREAM, not hidden behind some geo-locked paywall. Put in decent prize money to attract talent, heck have more of them so they are more commonly known about.
At a very basic level, people are only turning away from the 10000 because society in general now gets bored easy, wants quick results/validation and avoids harder work. Pull your pants up.
I watch a lot of 10's but it's only really the last 3 laps that are interesting.
Play on youtube> ffwd to 23 minutes in, watch.
All track running is pretty dull and boring, it just hasn't got the drama or the marathon, half marathon or even road 10k.
Once people are well dropped in the last 600m they rarely come back.
All coverage of 10k track races ideally would start at 20 mins (men) 25 mins (women), the rest is just wasted time for viewers
Have exactly 30 entrants. Each lap the last place runner gets removed. By the end you'll have 5 racers remaining who are very tired. ...But it won't be a jogfest.
They've tried something very similar to that in the European Teams Cup some years ago. It didn't work because of two reasons.
One was that the last placed runner made sure to sprint hard enough to have a "photo finish" in passing and could reliably say that he/she didn't know for sure that he/she was the last one to pass the line on that particular lap and therefore hade continued to run.
Number two was that some of the runners expected to be in the back of the back had ganged up on the organizers beforehand by agreeing to pass side-by-side like that anyway over the first half or two thirds of the race.
There was also a number three, where some good runners (but not good enough to win) simply refused to participate for their teams and throw away good form and the chance to set a PB by risking elimination with one or two or three laps to go.
Neither of this should matter in an INDIVIDUAL championship race where lapped runners just cause confusion to the none-initiated audience the sport want to reach - and have on occasion hindered the medalists from setting records by having them pass on the outside on later laps.
I wonder if the quote was fully accurate. BBC website athletics is predictably trite and poorly informed and I can imagine them slightly altering Keith's exact words to give a vaguely provocative headline. I love 10000s on track and tbh I'm not sure that any of the points raised against the distance dont apply equally to 5000. An extra 14 minutes but one can get bored in 2 minutes or stay excited for 4 hours.
The way modern 10000m are run are dull, I’m not that fast so I’m going to jog round and then on the last lap see who is the quickest 200m/400m runner. Yawn
“I’m not that fast”…huh? You’re saying Cheptegei, Kiplimo, Barega, Fisher et al aren’t that fast at 10k?
Most all of the time, the way these guys “jog around” at 27-28 minute 10k pace in warm weather with pace fluctuations means that the strongest 10k runners are the ones who can close fast enough to win or medal.
Yeah 30 mins for a female is nothing. 4th fastest ever by a female Brit.
Mustn't be interested in running if you haven't heard of her.
Maybe he saw the name Keith, didn't register the 'Megan' bit and jumped to a rapid and incorrect conclusion
No, he said “I’d never heard of her.” He’s just one of those a-holes who disparages female athletes because they’re not as fast as men. The lowest of the low trolls.
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There is no such person as a 5000m or 10000m runner.
There is no such person as a 5000m or 10000m runner.
Write down your list of favorite 5000m or favorite 10000m runners. If events for non-sprinters were: 800m, 1500m, 3000m, 3000mSC and Marathon, from an early age, athletes would adjust their training and race one or more than one of the five events listed.
Miruts Yifter, Prefontaine, Lasse Viren, Rod Dixon and others, in a 3000m race, that would have been fun to see. M Farah and the great 5000m & 10000m men of his era in 3000m races, that would have been exciting.