thletics 33 athletics
The last lap!
With DAVE BYRNE
THE DEATH OF CROSS COUNTRY Track and field athletics was once World Cross Country Championships Commonwealth Games, World Track and Field Championships, World one of the biggest sports in the world. on a yearly basis, to every second Road Running Champs, World Cup, Names like Jesse Owens, Roger year. World Indoors and the biggest event Bannister, Sebastian Coe, Carl There are several reasons why the of all – The Olympics, there’s more or Lewis and Michael Johnson regularly slow death of cross country may less one or two major events every featured in headlines around the have occurred. One contributing year. Couple these with national globe. But the days of athletics stars cause could be the dominance of titles, European Champs and the gracing the front pages of newspapers African’s. In the last edition of the has become an ever-decreasing World Cross Country Championships Golden League series, and where does another major event fit in? phenomenon – with the exception of the highest placed white male was After all, athletes do need some time the ‘it man’ Usain Bolt. Though it has Cales Castillejo from Spain in 26th to train and the occasional break yet to have been seen whether this place, and in the women’s event from the stresses of training and latest athletics phenomenon has the Kimberley Smith from New Zealand competition. ability to lead a long-term resurgence in the sports It seems as though many athletes would rather An argument could be forward that glory, popularity. compete in fun runs than championship cross put representing your country Coupled with the demise country races. And why wouldn’t you? and the riches that come of track and field athletics with possible success has been the gradual should be ample motivation to throw decline in the popularity of the World placed 13th. When you look at your hat in the ring and have a shot Cross Country Championships. the statistics, it’s understandable Not only has the distance running at the title. But glory exists for but that many of the elite non-African fraternity turned its back on the a few, and as mentioned earlier it’s runners would prefer to focus their event, but so too has public interest hard to see a non-African wining the attention on attainable goals, such waned, therefore leading the way for World Cross Country Championships. as the European Cross Country an exodus in event sponsorship and National pride still remains, but larger Championships, or simply focus publicity for the sport. events like the Olympics, and those on training through the winter and with more media coverage have far The World Cross Country competing in local events. greater prestige. A good example of Championships was at its peak in Another reason could be that maybe there are too many major events on this in Australia is how the winner of the 1980’s, but then leading into the international calendar. With the a fun run like the City to Surf, gets the late 90’s there was a distinct lack of support for the event from non-African nations. In a move to attract middle distance runners and hopefully make the event more appealing to European countries, the IAAF introduced a shorter, four kilometre option, in addition to the existing eight kilometre women’s race and 12 kilometre men’s event. This proved to be a failure, with African’s still dominating the lead pack and most of the non-African nations generally fielding what could only be termed “B-Grade” teams. Thus, the short course event was dropped from the program after 2006. The most recent development is that the IAAF the last non-african women to win the world has decided to go from running the cross was our own benita johnson (Willis).
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