Hardly any field events

[trackstar]

Man, the European events seem to give even shorter shrift to the field events than American meets. The GP meet in Austria today has men's PV and LJ, and women's HJ. That's it. Not a single throw.

[Guest]

Re: Hardly any field events

Havent been looking to watch any meets for a couple of weeks but you said
"no throws" and thats a travesty!
Obviouly I am a thrower.

[gh]

Re: Hardly any field events

For those of you who might have missed it or have forgotten it, here's the "We Think" editorial from this year's March issue.

<<Field Eventers Needn’t Apply?

The most important indoor meet groupings in both the U.S. (Golden Spike Tour) and Europe (Energizer Euroseries) gave short shrift to jumpers this year—and basically pretended throwers didn’t even exist.

Check out the opportunities: Boston—wPV; Millrose—mHJ/PV, wHJ/PV (and throws miles away earlier in the day); Tyson—mLJ, wPV; Gent—mPV/TJ, wHJ; Stockholm—mHJ/PV/TJ, wHJ/PV; Birmingham—mTJ, wHJ/PV/TJ; Liévin—mPV/TJ, wHJ.

We think that 22 field events total for 7 high-profile meets isn’t doing enough to keep the sport alive as a whole.
Complaints that indoor arenas are too cramped to stage more field events simply don’t hold water. One only need look back at the days when the U.S. had a huge, vibrant undercover circuit to put the lie to that statement. The long jump and shot were regular parts of many meets then, and that was at a time when all the tracks were only 160y in circumference. Most of them are now close to 40% larger. There’s acres of space in which to play inside a 200m oval.

We don’t know if TV producers actively campaign not to have infield action cluttering up the screen or if meet promoters just think that’s the way TV wants it, but it’s a trend that needs to be nipped in the bud. Yes, TV money is crucial to the continuing success of the sport, but at what cost?

We’re also troubled by the increasing marginalization of the field eventers at the USATF Championships, indoors and out. The scene has played out so that jumpers and throwers get ghettoized to early in the day and then the meet sometimes finishes with nothing but track going on. It might look good on TV, but it’s terrible for those sitting in the stands when those artificial TV breaks are inserted between events.

Jumpers and throwers deserve better.>>

[trackstar]

Re: Hardly any field events

USATF shot put last year is a fine example of why big meets need some throws. How many lead changes were there? I remember a bunch. I got excited just watching it on TV. (Exciting field event coverage on TV? No, really, it happened!) A friend who saw it live said it was amazing.

[tafnut]

Re: Hardly any field events

This month's ghT&FN rant is about lack of field info during a meet, which is a big source of the problem. If people actually knew what was going on, they'd see what they were missing - 'next up in the hammer is Murofushi, who currrently trails Annus by one meter - if he can throw past the white flag - Annus's current mark - he will take the lead with only one round to go, as you can see by the current standings on the Jumbotron'

yeah, that's gonna happen.