12 IM races and 7 of them official trademarked IMs and IMVoice has yet to call me in. ;-(
If I remember, back in the 80s there were a number of triathlons on the tube every year. It seemsed the PNF won every damned one of them for the women.
I think people would be interested in some shorter programs about other races, including some of the championships in the shorter events. But, what do I know–nothing. ;~/
I think that a vast majority of ‘normal’ people watch it. I had two of my neighbors ask me while I was walking my dog that they were looking for me on the broadcast. I had to explain to them, again, that I did IM WI, not Kona. Then they said, “Well, I know you’ll easily get there”.
Glad someone has confidence in me. To me, that shows that they know it’s hard and people love to watch another person challenge themselves. Unfortunately, not enough people want to go out and challenge themselves.
I only caught the last 45 min and thought it was pretty good.
Joe has had dozens of people tell him they saw him on the broadcast Saturday. Not one of them was a triathlete.
I’ll agree that the ratings info would likely prove me wrong as to total viewership of the show, but it seems sad to me that WTC, in its one opportunity each year for network coverage, chooses to court the random channel surfer and the Emmy voters instead of its core audience.
Also, I agree with Mike Reilly and everyone who says that the show is inspiring and influences people. No argument there. I have copies of nearly every broadcast from 1989 on. I just think it could be a better show and WTC should be pleased, not offended, that there are those of us who support their races every year who care enough about the Ironman to make suggestions as to improvements.
Finally, I’m sure this has been discussed here before, but why don’t you think WTC/NBC has decided to put out a “hard core” Hawaii IM DVD? Two to three hours of straight pro and AG coverage. You could have Babbitt, Huddle and Welch do the commentary, like they do on online. It seems like there might be enough interest to put that together and it would be an alternative to the NBC coverage. I know there’s the race day coverage on the website, but I think a DVD could also sell. I’d be willing to pay $30 to $50 bucks for that.
Here’s how the thinking seems to go in Triathlon Fantasy Island …
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Triathletes want non-triathletes to be very impressed with an ironman finish.
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Triathletes want non-triathletes to be big fans of Ironman racing.
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Triathletes want non-triathletes to watch the race on TV, buy products or some other contribution that leads to bigger money for the pro racers.
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Triathletes don’t want any of these non-triathletes to actually want to a race, because then the exclusivity of it will decrease, and well …
-
… the secret will be out that finishing an IM race isn’t the “climbing Mt. Everest” that it once seemed to be. That image is kind of hard to maintain when the overweight soccer-mom down the street finished IMWI.
That’s exactly what I think. I keep hearing how it’s great that IM is on T.V to attract more people to the sport and yet we all complain when you have to register a year in advance. I think triathletes want people to watch so they will be more impressed but don’t really care if they get out and actually get off the couch. Does it REALLY matter to triathletes if their neighbor is fat and lazy or do we REALLY like it because we look good in comparison.
Triathlon (particularly IM) will never be a T.V hit and we should just accept it and continue in our sport in obscurity. It’s not about impressing others, we are supposed to be doing this for ourselves.
Excellent wrap-up although I didn’t see the coverage. In general the network telecast of the Ironman is for the mass audience and the Ironmanlive.com webcast is for us guys.
My boss (a runner) just told me he watched and that he could care less about the pros, but loved the human interest stories.
Me, I like it all and I am glad it is on TV. It turned me onto the sport 2 years ago, but I thought I could just go to Kona direct!!! Little did I know I would have to go sub-10 to really get there!!
Maybe all of the new interest after this showing will bring about Ironman North Carolina with 200 Kona qualifying spots, ideally all of them in the M30-34 age group!!
“the secret will be out that finishing an IM race isn’t the “climbing Mt. Everest” that it once seemed to be”
No secret.
About 10 years ago I seem to recall reading an article in Outside magazine that rated some of the top physical and endurance achievments. It severly down-played finishing an Ironman as one of the top endurance achievements. Main reason: How could it be that hard if so many people where finishing it every year. I note that this was back when there were only 5 - 6 IM races worldwide each year. This argument has only gained more and more momentum as they keep adding more and more IM races to the schedule.
Here’s how the thinking seems to go in Triathlon Fantasy Island …
-
Triathletes want non-triathletes to be very impressed with an ironman finish.
-
Triathletes want non-triathletes to be big fans of Ironman racing.
-
Triathletes want non-triathletes to watch the race on TV, buy products or some other contribution that leads to bigger money for the pro racers.
-
Triathletes don’t want any of these non-triathletes to actually want to a race, because then the exclusivity of it will decrease, and well …
-
… the secret will be out that finishing an IM race isn’t the “climbing Mt. Everest” that it once seemed to be. That image is kind of hard to maintain when the overweight soccer-mom down the street finished IMWI.
That’s exactly what I think. I keep hearing how it’s great that IM is on T.V to attract more people to the sport and yet we all complain when you have to register a year in advance. I think triathletes want people to watch so they will be more impressed but don’t really care if they get out and actually get off the couch. Does it REALLY matter to triathletes if their neighbor is fat and lazy or do we REALLY like it because we look good in comparison.
Triathlon (particularly IM) will never be a T.V hit and we should just accept it and continue in our sport in obscurity. It’s not about impressing others, we are supposed to be doing this for ourselves.
The first time I have ever agreed with both of you. Excellent posts.
The first time I have ever agreed with both of you. Excellent posts.
See what happens when we leave the Lavender Room.
The first time I have ever agreed with both of you. Excellent posts.
See what happens when we leave the Lavender Room.
You finally come to your senses? ;^)
Finally, I’m sure this has been discussed here before, but why don’t you think WTC/NBC has decided to put out a “hard core” Hawaii IM DVD? Two to three hours of straight pro and AG coverage. You could have Babbitt, Huddle and Welch do the commentary, like they do on online. It seems like there might be enough interest to put that together and it would be an alternative to the NBC coverage. I know there’s the race day coverage on the website, but I think a DVD could also sell. I’d be willing to pay $30 to $50 bucks for that.
Great idea and I would definately buy it.
My favorite part of the broadcast was the focus on Macca/Normann and Macca’s effort to catch him. I’m always inspired and moved by the Hoyt story (and others like Herreman/Downing/Rozelle), but seems it seems like every broadcast is becoming more and more the same.
The first time I have ever agreed with both of you. Excellent posts.
I would make a somehwta entertaining quirk about me being an educator and you learning … but I won’t. =)
Seriously … we probably agree much more than we disagree on many things … it’s just the nature of the forum and especially the LR to debate the things we don’t agree on versus just starting a thread followed by numerous “Yeah, what he said.”, “I agree”, “Good Post” type comments. What fun would that be?
Give us a grill, a sports event, and some beverages, and throughout the discussion we’d probably agree on 9 out 10 things … but spend 99% of the time talking about the 1 thing we disagree about. 
My favorite part of the broadcast was the focus on Macca/Normann and Macca’s effort to catch him.
Mine too!!
Everyone here at work knows I do triathlons and travel to Ironman races. Not one person watched the broadcast. The only person who mentioned watching is one of the tri club gals that I swim with. She’s fairly new to triathlon and her comment…they made it look like you can just fly to Hawaii and do the race (she knows otherwise).
clm
Unfortunately, I think AG competition would be next to impossible to cover easily. Between the sexes, what are there, something like 22 age groups? The pros had ten or so of each gender in and out of the front during the race. Most of the age groups would have a similar number. How would you cover that? How many cameras? Motorcycles? How much film to edit?
At best, I think you could get fixed camera positions at certain key locations, run the cameras continually, and sequence the results for each age group. But that formula would be extremely dry I suspect. There wouldn’t be any head to head racing coverage, or passing sequences.
No one at my office mentioned it either, so I give up. I don’t know who the hell watches the show other than my friends, family and the people at the IM viewing parties we all know about. I’m pledging to myself to accept the NBC show as it is and not spend any more time criticizing the coverage.
As to covering the AGers on my proposed “hard core” DVD, you could do post race interviews with AGers worthy of coverage and include any video footage or still photos available on those athletes and you could have a chapter on the DVD that would show all the AG winners crossing the finish line, with their times and a graphic of the top 5 in each AG.
I read that all 20 hours of the online coverage are still available for viewing on the website, but condensing that into 2 or 3 hours on a DVD makes sense to me.
Have you ever watched the broadcast of the ITU Age Group World Championships? It’s exactly that, very dry and they only manage to cover a very few racers.
Really, all the talk about the limited coverage of IMH seems kind of funny to me. When I think back, I remember seeing Julie Moss crawling over the finish line. I can’t remember how long that clip lasted, but it was enough to drive me to getting off the couch and actually getting out there and training/racing. If something, anything connects on any level with someone watching on Sunday and inspires them, it is good for our sport. I think the best way to televise an IM is to include all the special interest stuff. You broaden your chances of connecting with someone. We here at ST have already been bitten (or devoured) by the bug. We already know who won the race, their splits, what they rode, etc. The coverage on NBC was just gravy and something I watched with my wife/kids/parents and it kept their attention. They likely wouldn’t have sat through endless race coverage…
Brad
Not that anybody cares, but the Nielson ratings for the show were 1.3, basically that means a little over 1.4 million people watched the coverage
.