The Toni & Matt Show #10
Welcome to our 10th episode, a small milestone and definite turning point for the show. We’d like to count the first 9 episodes as practice - our time to learn the medium and find our voice. We’ve received great feedback from you; please keep it coming by emailing us at comments (at) runnerville (dot) com. But don’t just email us - join the community, join the discussion. Send us your audio comments by calling 206-888-0346. That’s the only way we’ll make the influencers and decision makers of the sport take notice - with many voices.
Okay, on to today’s show:
[3:55 - 21:15] The Big Story - The Payton Jordan Invitational at Stanford University.
Shalane Flanagan and Kim Smith save the night with their epic duel over 10,000 meters, both setting national records in the process (30:34.49 for Flanagan to 30:35.54 for Smith). Without that race the meet would have been a let-down. Expectations were so high going into the weekend, but fast times did not materialize, especially at 800m and 1500m. Of course there were some impressive results, but the winning times were not as anticipated. Other stories included: Brent Vaughn, Scotty Bauhs, Shannon Rowbury impress, Fasil Bizuneh just misses the A standard, no Rupp or Gouchers, and why in the world would they split the 1500m into two “equal” heats? Not what the fans want . . .
[21:15 - 1:05:45] Nate Jenkins joins us in the “studio” from Lowell, Massachusetts, home to Toni’s first radio gig. Nate finished 7th at last year’s US Olympic Marathon Trials in NYC, setting his PR of 2:14:56. We asked Nate to be on the show after receiving a great, if not long, audio comment. His comment had some constructive criticism for the show, some positive feedback, and some great ideas to improve the sport. Instead of playing his comment on the show, we thought it would be better to open up the conversation and invite him on the show. What a guest! We discuss the complexity of our sport, the sad state of television coverage, USATF’s lack of financial support, and uniform rules. We ask Nate if the athletes should unionize. And Toni unveils our newest segment - The Hot House - to incubate ideas for the sport. He presents his first Hot House idea to Nate - making a half-marathon series with teams - who’s a big fan.
[1:07:22 - 1:18:00] Listener comment from Kevin referencing an Tim Layden article in the May 5 edition of sports illustrated titled: Once They Were Giants - After years of drug scandals, track faces its future as a minor Olympic sport. A sad look at the decline of track’s position on the Olympic stage. This year swimming and gymnastics will take center stage. A real eye-opener for the powers that be. Layden’s best point: the danger for our sport is not outrage, it’s apathy. Amen!
Listen in next week for Episode #11. We’ll be joined by Matt Tegenkamp and we have audio call ins from Dan Lilot and funny-man Jeremy Mosher. You can add your voice to the conversation by calling us at 206-888-0346 - just leave your comment after the beep.
[Music is “Same Old Drag” by Apples in Stereo.]
Last 5 posts by Matt Taylor- The Toni & Matt Show #9 - May 1st, 2008
- Runnerville Weekly #14 - April 29th, 2008
- The Toni & Matt Show #8 - April 19th, 2008
- Runnerville Weekly #13 - April 16th, 2008
- Runnerville Weekly #12 - April 8th, 2008
May 7th, 2008 at 10:24 am |
Toni, Matt and Nate,
Great job this week guys! I really like the new vision of the show, offering ideas and a positivity to the sport rather than any negative aspect that may creep up.
Bringing on a professional runner to express their thoughts on certain viewpoints is certainly a direction Runnerville should explore further. The athletes are as much of the solution to grow our sport as anyone else, so getting them involved and expressing their ideas is great.
Toni - Your idea for a four race, half-marathon team series sounds excellent, although I do question the half-marathon distance. I think for a fan standpoint and athlete acceptance standpoint having a 5k or 10k series makes a little more sense than a half-marathon series. EliteRacing already has their courses for each race laid out, could they just use the same course, but only 5k or 10k worth of it?
I think the fall season concept to any team racing series is the smartest move as well. The most underappreciated aspect of our sport is the potential fan base at the high school level. With hundreds of thousands of athletes participating in cross country and track and field each year, this base needs to be marketed too. This type of series makes sense, especially if it is marketed to the fall marathoners and high school harriers. Marketing would actually be fairly easy and cost efficient, but that is for a whole other discussion. To conclude my point…distance runners are the largest fan base in our sport, the most opinionated and probably the most willing to support a professional racing circuit. Great idea Toni. I am sure many others would love to hear more plans on such a series.
Keep up the great work guys!
May 7th, 2008 at 12:34 pm |
Scott,
These musical marathons and half-marathons are branded. So we have to find a way to utilize pro athletes within the context of that structure. While it would be better to shorten or vary the distances in a best-case scenario, we must work within the confines of the marketplace as it exists. This has to make sense to Elite Racing from a business standpoint. And as long as all the athletes are competing on an even playing field, then the half-marathon distance won’t be so much of an issue. Thanks for the input.
May 8th, 2008 at 12:08 pm |
About halfway through the show you guys touched on something that I think is very important and often overlooked in the marketing of distance running. You mentioned how the tour de France coverage does not cater to someone who doesn’t know anything about cycling and assumes the audience is actually somewhat intelligent, rather than getting some celebrity news anchor to ask dumb questions for all the novices watching. This has to be done in our track and marathon coverage, it would make all the difference in the world.
Expounding on that point, I think track media in general needs to stop this focus on catering to novice runners. I;ve said it before, the best way to get fans is to develop top-notch, intelligent and fun media (written media and television/video) for its current fans, people who already know that alan webb broke Ryun’s hs record and who know how many laps make a mile and dont need to be told these facts over and over again. Once you develop more interesting and pervasive media, I think that, more than anything, will attract a larger (and more invested) audience.
I like Toni’s idea of a fall racing series, and other ideas that shake up the racing structure, a lot and that stuff would definitely help, but covering the races that are run in the best way possible will go a long way.
My point: invest more time/energy/money into captivating media
thanks guys
May 8th, 2008 at 2:17 pm |
If I don’t already know that Webb broke Ryun’s record, then telling me that he broke it isn’t going to do anything for me.
That said, I have to disagree with Ben: if someone doesn’t explain to me how fast I would have to run a lap at my local high school track to keep up with the marathoners in London, Chicago or Boston… then I’m just lost. Sorry.
May 9th, 2008 at 11:56 am |
Hey guys, this was really a great show and I have a bunch of comments regarding it.
First, why is there this need for people like Flanagan and Goucher to move up to the marathon. Is it just due to the bigger appearance fees and financial gains?
Loved the segment with Nate Jenkins. While I enjoy The Final Sprint podcasts, those are mostly runners talking about themselves. It’s great to hear smart, articulate, professionals in our sport talk about “the system”, appearance fees, unions, racing series, etc. Hopefully we’ll hear more of this in the future too. Even Nate’s simple idea of interviewing coaches like Lananna during a meet could add to a broadcast.
Toni, I understand your idea about focusing on competition rather than time, but you have to be careful with your NBA playoff scenario. I think a lot of people are turned off to the NBA during the regular season because it’s not very exciting. However, these same people will watch the playoffs when the intensity is kicked into high gear.
I know a lot of the talk revolves around getting on TV and getting at the general public. However, it seems like the youth of today spent more time on sites like utube for entertainment. Maybe the next generation of track fans will be alright with watching meets on sites like Flotrack, Runnerspace, etc.
Finally, I think it’s great that you’re having these discussions because it gets other people talking, blogging and linking to these topics. Keep up the great work.