Joan Llaneras of Spain riding uptrack of the peleton in the Men's Point Race. Save this photo, because you won't be seeing action like this at any future Olympics.DANIEL GARCIA/AFP/Getty Images.
In my opinion, this is less about gender parity than it is about loading the track racing programme with short, explosive races that can be televised easily and require less attention from the average viewer. No disrespect to the sprinters, and definitely no disrespect to the female cyclists who absolutely deserve to race the exact same programme as men, but seriously, getting rid of the best endurance races is a joke, and reduces track racing to just one of its many aspects, all in the name of "good television." Okay, so, there are still World Championships every year, and lots of World Cup events, but the Olympics has always been the global showcase for the variety that makes up track racing, the one opportunity for non-cyclists to watch a bit of mental Madison action, and I think it's a big mistake to cut these events.
Oh, but they added 7-a-side rugby, a game played by almost nobody and followed by literally hundreds of people around the world. So, that's great...
10 comments:
I love track racing and am sad that this is happening bit I also played rugby and live watching it. 7s is huge, probably bigger that track cycling. Need to hate on other sports bro.
No hate, just a little joke!
I'm living in Fiji right now so I know a good bit about 7s, and while I agree that it's more popular than I made out, there's still no way it has the following that track cycling does. Both are minority sports, but c'mon, the crowds at even the IRB World 7s Series games are always tiny.
Either way, I'm sure we could both agree on a sport that shouldn't be at the Olympics in place of 7s, or the Madison. But, that's the point really, isn't it? There are always going to be people who want to see their particular sport represented, and unless the IOC decide to turn the Olympics into a 6 week event, someone has to lose out. It's just a pity that track cycling got screwed...
I agree, it's sad the IOC has the cut sports in order to package it up nice and nearly in three weeks to sell it to television. Why not go four weeks? I mean it only happens every four years.
Hold on, though. They didn't ditch those events - they just crammed 'em into an omnium.
And I haven't really read anything from anybody about what's so damn bad about an omnium.
I don't think that the UCI ought to try and make rules to shove cycling back toward the good-old-days stuff, but I do like the notion of an omnium. More dynamic and less specialized, it will be unpredictable and require a lot of different skills.
The Omnium is a legitimate event in it's own right but telling endurance racers to console themselves with the scratch, points and pursuit in the omnium is silly. None of those events are stand alone events. AND they're all significantly shorter. I'm sure you've raced multiple events in a row, with only 30 minutes break in between - it's the typical format for weekly races and velodrome challenges. Having multiple events per day is completely different than having one event per day. Your warm-up changes as does your strategy. A 10K points race is completely different than a 25K points (for the women).
Taking away the stand alone endurance events and Madison will also probably affect who races the Olympics, there may not get the road/track cross over that we have seen in the past.
On the bright side, at least now the women have the keirin.
WTF are you on about?
I'm from Spain and I'm a great fan of Joan Llaneras. He is now retired from cycling, but he is one of the best spanish athletes in Olympic Games.
Cheers from un saludo desde my blog
Sorry about leaving that spam comment about politics up there for so long! It's been deleted now, but that makes Anon's WTF comment look like it's directed at Val, which it isn't.
its the multiple weight catogories for shit like taiquando that I think sucks.
cycling doesn't need the oylmpics, should try and get the world champs more exposure
why havent i seen more camera on rails kinda setups for track racing? Build it into the wall and have a pacing shot of the leader with the pack behind! HOT!
They have cameras floating in every shot of pro football. If they want to make endurance track racing more interesting give the audience a couple more angles.
What will they do when the genders are totally balanced, and men still make 30% more? (thats just an overall average in the sports world the differences in $ are probably measured in magnitudes). Im glad they are trying something but this seems like putting a bandaid on a zombie.
anyway, thanks for the coverage.
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