Marathon Coverage on TV

I watched the marathon coverage of Brighton Marathon on Channel 4 today. It was great to re-live the weekend and nice to see running represented on TV, even if it was really early in the morning.

I think overall they did a pretty good job of capturing the atmosphere and excitement of the weekend. It was also good to see what the elite runners got up to as I only briefly saw them a couple of times as they whizzed past going the the opposite direction to me.

However, there were three parts of the coverage that I felt were a bit disappointing (I’ve also noticed the same in coverage of other races). In this post I want to talk about them and suggest some improvements that the producers might want to consider for the future.

The Phrase ‘The Masses’

My first complaint is with the use of the term ‘the masses’ to describe everyone who isn’t one of the elite runners. This seems a very disingenuous way to describe people who have trained hard, covered hundreds or thousands of miles and gone out in all weather to make it to a marathon.

These runners are putting in just as much effort as the elites and describing them as ‘masses’ just doesn’t capture how special they are. It make it seems as if any old person can just pitch up and run a marathon.

For me ‘the masses’ are the millions of people sitting and home who wouldn’t dream of stepping up and attempting a marathon. Those who are there and actually doing it, no matter how fast or slow, are athletes.

My suggestion for the commentators would therefore be that rather than saying “…and going back to the masses” they instead go for “…and returning to the main group of athletes”. Much more empowering and rewarding.

Time Goals For Non-Elites

The other thing that annoyed me was when the commentator had just finished discussing times and paces of the elite runners and then returned to the main group with the phrase “….and of course for many of these runners time isn’t important, they will just be aiming to finish the race”. How patronising!

Yes, there are probably some runners for whom just finishing is the goal. However, I expect that there are far more who are there with a specific time in mind, with a personal best to be beaten or a challenge to be met.

It think it very demeaning to just assume that just because a person isn’t running sub 5-minute miles that their only aim is to make it to the end without collapsing. Please commentators, give everyone a little more credit for all their hard work and effort.

Sub-Elite Runner Coverage

It was great to see the elite Kenyan runners at the front of the field feature heavily in the coverage. It’s lovely to watch how smoothly they run. Seeing the main group of athletes, those in costume and those doing excellent charity fund raising work was also great. It’s nice to see so many people getting involved in and taking pleasure from running.

Unfortunately the coverage just seemed to flip between the front elite group and those who would be finishing in about 4 hours 15 minutes or longer. What about the three thousand runners in the gap between these two ends of the spectrum? Aside from a few panning shots this group of runners was barely shown at all.

This seems a shame when you consider that this group probably contains a large number of dedicated club runners, people targeting specific times (a good-for-age for London, a qualifying time for Boston) and a vast amount of marathoning experience.

The runners in this group will also be people with families, holding down full-time jobs and also managing to train regularly and possibly coach others as well. They should be an inspiration to others who want to go beyond just completing their first marathon. They show what is possible with hard work and dedication. Producers, please give them a bit of air time as well.

With just a tiny bit of improvement, excellent marathon coverage could be amazing and serve as an inspiration not just for people to attempt a marathon but also to those who want to push themselves to even better performances. Lets up the game and really showcase the full range of athletes, from those running just over two hours right down to those fighting all the way to make it to the end.