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Let The European and North American Olympics Winter Games Begin



 
 
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  #1  
Old February 6th 06, 01:40 AM
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Default Let The European and North American Olympics Winter Games Begin

Where the Rich and Elite Meet to Compete
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...020302280.html

Where the Rich and Elite Meet to Compete

By Paul Farhi
Sunday, February 5, 2006; B01

Never mind the usual puffery about what this month's Winter Olympics
are all about. Sure, there's the beauty of sports, the spirit of
friendly competition, the dedication of great athletes and all that.
But the Winter Games are about a few other things as well: elitism,
exclusion and the triumph of the world's sporting haves over its have
nots.

What the Winter Games are not is a truly international sporting
competition that brings the best of the world together to compete, as
the promotional blather would have you believe. Unlike the widely
attended Summer Olympics, the winter version is almost exclusively the
preserve of a narrow, generally wealthy, predominantly Caucasian
collection of athletes and nations. In fact, I'd suggest that the name
of the Winter Games, which start Friday, be changed. They could be more
accurately branded "The European and North American Expensive Sports
Festival."

Throughout most of the Winter Olympics' history, the parade of
participating nations has been a short one. Until as recently as 1994,
fewer than a third of the planet's countries took part. This year, in
Turin, Italy, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) expects
delegations from about 85 countries, an all-time high, but still barely
43 percent of the world's total. Even that exaggerates the extent of
participation. Many of the nations in the Opening Ceremonies will be
represented by tokens, some consisting entirely of sports bureaucrats,
not athletes. Ethiopia, a nation of 73 million, will send its first
"team" to a Winter Olympics this year -- a single skier.

As always, the biggest delegations, and the big winners, will come from
a familiar pool. In the history of the winter competition, dating from
its inception in 1924, competitors from only six countries -- the
Soviet Union/Russia, Germany (East, West and combined), Norway, the
United States, Austria and Finland, in that order -- have won almost
two-thirds of all the medals awarded. Only 17 countries have ever
amassed more than 10 medals during the past 19 winter Olympiads. Only
38 countries have won even one medal.

This had turned the Winter Olympics into a remarkably insular
competition. The Czech Republic (and Czechoslovakia before it) has won
more medals than China, home to about one-fifth of humanity. Norway, a
nation with a population smaller than metropolitan Washington, has won
three times as many winter medals as the nations of Asia, Latin and
South America, Australia and Polynesia, the Middle East and the
Caribbean Basin combined.

By contrast, the all-time list of summer winners is long and deep,
extending to athletes from 143 countries, including such places as
Tonga, Paraguay and Burundi. The Summer Games have medal hogs, too, but
nothing like winter ones. The top six in the summer -- the United
States, the Soviet Union/Russia, Germany, France, Britain and Italy --
have swept up slightly more than half the medals since the modern games
started in 1896.

Obviously, the climate and terrain in, say, Indonesia or Aruba aren't
highly conducive to molding superstar aerial skiers and biathlon
champions. But it's not just the presence or absence of snow and ice
that determines Winter Olympics success, or even participation. If it
were, some of America's best ice skaters and speedskaters wouldn't live
and train in Southern California or Florida. If it were, athletes from
countries like Peru, Chile, Nepal, Morocco, Afghanistan and Ethiopia --
all blessed with soaring, snow-covered mountains -- would be marching
en masse in the Opening Ceremonies and fighting for the medal stand.

Instead, the more telling factors are economic. Would-be Winter
Olympians need years of training, coaching and competition if they're
going to make it to the Games. All of these things require massive sums
of money. A bobsled (or bobsleigh, in official IOC-speak) costs about
$35,000, to say nothing of what it costs to build an Olympic-caliber
bobsled run. A pair of speedskates might be relatively cheap, but how
many countries have speedskating rinks? Most nations, even those with
plenty of snow and cold, simply can't afford such extravagances.

Remember the Jamaican bobsled team? Those lovable underdogs endeared
themselves to many with their participation in the 1988 games in
Calgary (the four-man team was the subject of the 1993 Disney movie
"Cool Runnings" and finished a surprisingly high 14th in 1994). Less
well-known is what happened -- or didn't happen -- to the Jamaicans in
the 2002 games in Salt Lake City: They didn't show up. The team ran out
of funding and had to stay home.

Unlike the Winter Games, the Summer Olympics level many of the
advantages of national wealth, as well as favorable geography and
climate. It takes all the usual things to become a Summer Olympian --
heart, outsized talent and the ability to devote most of your waking
hours to your sport -- but the barriers to entry are much lower.
Athletes from the poorest African and Caribbean nations have developed
into some of the world's greatest athletes with shockingly minimal, or
even nonexistent, facilities and equipment.

In winter sports, by contrast, the rich keep getting richer. Nations
wealthy enough to host a Winter Olympics tend to be those that win most
of the medals (17 of the 20 Winter Olympics have been held in Western
Europe, Canada or the United States). And hosting the Games tends to
ensure future success; the expensive facilities left behind -- the ski
jumps, skeleton runs, half-pipes, etc. -- become training grounds for
the next generation of Olympians.

Baron Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the modern Olympics,
recognized some of these global sporting inequities more than a century
ago. De Coubertin objected to the creation of a separate Winter
Olympics for many years, dismissing winter sports in 1921 as "the
snobbish play of the rich." It wasn't until 1924 -- some 28 years after
the first modern Olympics -- that the IOC retroactively recognized
something called the "International Week of Winter Sports" in Chamonix,
France, as the first Winter Olympics.

So why perpetuate an event that could just as easily be contested as a
series of disaggregated annual championships? The reason, of course, is
money and TV. And here again, it's a small world. The Winter Olympics
might collapse were it not for the financial support of American
broadcasters and their (mostly) American advertisers. Like the teams
themselves, the audience for the Winter Olympics is predominantly North
American and European, accounting for about two-thirds of all worldwide
viewing during the Salt Lake City Games of 2002, according to the IOC.
This is just fine by the Olympics' "worldwide" sponsors -- companies
like Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Panasonic and Visa -- whose biggest markets
are in these places, too. Indeed, with NBC paying about half of all the
fees for TV rights the IOC collects, American sponsors and broadcasters
call the tune. In 1994, facing sponsor "fatigue" from same-year Summer
and Winter Olympics, the IOC decided to stagger the two seasons' Games,
so that the Winter Olympics now take place two years after the summer
ones.

This is not to suggest that Winter Olympians aren't dedicated and
superb athletes. They are, of course. But the pool of actual and
potential competitors in, say, luge or curling (or skeleton or biathlon
or bobsledding or freestyle moguls skiing) is ludicrously small and
will probably remain so for years to come. The Winter Olympics simply
aren't, and probably can't be, a truly global sporting contest.

So please, in the next few weeks, spare us the hokum about the nations
of the world joining together in a symbolic celebration of the human
spirit. Some nations and some human spirit maybe, but unfortunately,
all too precious little.

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  #2  
Old February 6th 06, 02:44 AM
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What a completely idiotic and weenie article.

  #3  
Old February 6th 06, 03:07 AM
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Mike wrote:
They could be
more accurately branded "The European and North American Expensive
Sports Festival."


Dang. I guess we and the Kiwis aren't in it then. Ditto the Argentineans
and the Chileans. Or the South Africans.

What an ignorant article. Do we have to import snow to hot countries that
have none? On a US news channel tonight, I saw a "gee whizz" spot about how
funny foreign people were entering the Games, and they showed Australian
Skeleton racers pracising in the outback. They never once mentioned that
Australia has quite a bit of snow and mountains. Morons.

Shame the article didn't mention that if you are watching the Games in the
US, you'll see nothing that doesn't have a yank flag stuck on it. You won't
see other countries athletes unless they are about to win something (maybe).
You'll just see US athletes, and lots of dross about the local curiosities.
And a ****LOAD of ****ing figure skating. I wish they'd give PBS the
screening rights. We'd actually see The Games.

--
ant



  #4  
Old February 6th 06, 03:24 AM
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"ant" wrote in message
...
Mike wrote:
They could be
more accurately branded "The European and North American Expensive
Sports Festival."


Dang. I guess we and the Kiwis aren't in it then. Ditto the Argentineans
and the Chileans. Or the South Africans.


I guess the days of the Jamaican Bobsled team have passed.


  #5  
Old February 6th 06, 09:25 AM
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On 5 Feb 2006 17:40:20 -0800, "Mike" wrote:

Where the Rich and Elite Meet to Compete
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...020302280.html

Where the Rich and Elite Meet to Compete


What a stupid article.

What it seems to miss entirely is the basic reason why most
competitors come from a relatively small range of countries.

Namely that a large majority of winter sports competitors come from
counties that *have* a significant winter.

It mentions the fact that Ethiopia will have "just" one competitor -
but exactly where in Ethiopia do they see snow or ice most winters?
--
Alex Heney, Global Villager
Bugs are Sons of Glitches!
To reply by email, my address is alexATheneyDOTplusDOTcom
  #6  
Old February 6th 06, 05:22 PM
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Mary Malmros wrote:
What a completely idiotic and weenie article.


I agree with you - the article is a slam piece. But I also agree that
there is something real underlying the article.

I think the Winter Olympics could do better at inclusion. There's no
excuse for the Jamaicans to be excluded for financial reasons when their
Bobsled team was otherwise qualified. Possible the dominant countries
could create a financial pool for such cases?

Also, while I think it's dangerous for Eddy the Eagle to jump or Sulidan
the Slink to run a downhill, and therefore support qualifying results
before entry in the Olympics is allowed, a "preliminary" open to all
countries could be run in each discipline, following entry
qualifications similar to those minor league racing uses (The Tahoe
League uses no top 10 finishers in Far West races, I believe. Equivalent
might be no FIS points nn?) Maybe the podium from the pre-races could
be allowed into the "real" Olympics - certainly the safety issue would
have been addressed. Many of the warm countries could round up some
ex-pat but still citizens who've been living in winter-countries to be
their entries in numerous disciplines, who could afford to enter the
preliminaries. Such opportunities would go along way toward inclusion
without materially impacting the Winter Games.
  #7  
Old February 6th 06, 05:24 PM
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Haven't you seen Cool Runnin'?
  #8  
Old February 6th 06, 06:01 PM
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lal_truckee wrote:

Mary Malmros wrote:

What a completely idiotic and weenie article.



I agree with you - the article is a slam piece. But I also agree that
there is something real underlying the article.

I think the Winter Olympics could do better at inclusion. There's no
excuse for the Jamaicans to be excluded for financial reasons when their
Bobsled team was otherwise qualified. Possible the dominant countries
could create a financial pool for such cases?


Lal, people in North American and European countries are "excluded", as
the article calls it, all the time for financial reasons. Except in the
few countries like China that maintain a comprehensive state-sponsored
development system, an athlete whose family can't foot the bill or
otherwise provide the opportunities, isn't going to have the chance.
People from the United States don't get some kind of pass because
they're from a "wealthy" nation; the ones who can muster the resources
get the opportunities, and the ones who can do something with those
opportunities get a trip to the Olympics. Everybody else stays home.

I also have to ask, what's the point of, for instance, Brazil having an
alpine skier in the Olympics? Alpine skiing means nothing in Brazil; it
means something in Austria and Norway and parts of the USA. How
meaningful is "inclusion" when the thing you're being included in just
isn't on your radar scope in the first place?

  #9  
Old February 6th 06, 10:02 PM
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Well, yea, ski racing (for one) is a damn expensive winter sport. And,
not just cash wise. The time commitment is pretty big as well. Unless
you live at the base of a ski area, there will be travel involved.
Race days can take you across the state, which means gas, lodging, food
and even more time. The price of equipment is quite high. Most age
class kids will have several pair of skis for training and racing the
various diciplines. Wax, tunung gear, lift tickets, clothing (speed
suits, protective clothing, training clothes) - way expensive, even
with team sponsored discounts. Oh yea, the team. It ain't basketball
at the local rec center folks. Training fees for the season will set
you back about $1,500 for even the most basic age class program.

I think there are ways for the average Joe to see his child to the
elite level if the child is a gifted athlete and really wants it AND
the parent wants it for their child. But, the average Joe will have to
sacrifice a heck of a lot more than the wealthy that can send his kid
to BMA with unlimited funds to fuel the kid to the top.

This would have been a much more intesting article if the writer would
have done some research on what kind of cash it takes to get a kid to
the top in the various winter sports. Citing the cost of a bobsled was
a start. But, I'm sure there is a hell of a lot more then just that
cost.

I personally would love to see more programs like NBS.

Here is an interesting artcle about NBS:
http://www.skimag.com/skimag/fall_li...327626,00.html

From the article:

"But the challenges facing young African-American ski racers are
daunting. First, there is the cold cash needed to groom a winner: The
NBS says that it takes about $30,000 per year to send a child to an
elite ski academy and pay for travel to races."
--
Marty

  #10  
Old February 6th 06, 11:54 PM
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Marty wrote:

From the article:

"But the challenges facing young African-American ski racers are
daunting. First, there is the cold cash needed to groom a winner: The
NBS says that it takes about $30,000 per year to send a child to an
elite ski academy and pay for travel to races."


Well, hell, Picabo Street's family sure didn't have any $30K a year to
spend on school. For that matter, neither did Bode Miller's.

 




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