'20 DL schedule released [and event distribution]

[gh]

Inconvenient truth: staging extra events only adds cost to the meet promoter and is unlikely to put many more butts in the seat. And the added cost is not insigificant, when you figure there's $30,000 in prize money required. Making up some numbers, for each of the 8 athletes you tack on $500 in airfare, so that's another $4000. Then figure 3 days of room & board at $200 per night, so that's another $4800, so in the blink of an eye you've added $40K to your cost of staging the meet.

I suspect most meet promoters are absolutely thrilled at having fewer events to contend with.

[Atticus]

I suspect most meet promoters are absolutely thrilled at having fewer events to contend with.

Absolutely. There were also thrilled to pay women far less than men until the sport addressed that. This is something that has to be done for the future of the sport.

[gh]

interesting tweet:

Costas Goulas
@lsabre_Avenger
·
Interesting that five of the nominees for the IAAF World Male and Female Athlete Of The Year come from the events that have just been axed from the Diamond League. Personally, I feel that none of them should turn up in Monaco on November 23 but I don't think I can expect that.

[ATK]

The Wanda partnership has also enabled us at World Athletics to invest more significantly in the World Athletics Continental Tour, which will be a series of between 10 and 12 Meetings covering disciplines that will not be in the Diamond League, as well as some that are.

10-12 meetings means even less chance for these 4 events to be shown relative to the others since the DL now has 14 meetings.

[ShaunPickering]

If this is face-value true, it softens the blow, but the loss from being in the DL itself, is still a problem. Since the field events can be easily held before the window, and summarized (in video highlights) during the significant down-time even in a 90-min window, shouldn't they try that for a year before letting them go to twist in the wind?

The field events are already suffering because they are not being shown properly. That is already the problem with just the Top 3 throws from earlier in the day, and they are supposed to compete form popularity off that, they do not tell the story of the event. This is like showing hurdle 2, 7 and 9 from a hurdle race!

THe 90 minute window is exactly the main problem here, as it comes with a 120 minute full programme limit, which is not enough to hold two consecutive horizontal jumps or long throws in that window, and particularly 4 consecutive events in the Final, so they cut one of each! If they had chosen 120 minute tv broadcast (150 min full programme), they would not need to cut Triple Jump and Discus, so by not fighting for 120 minutes, they are disrespecting 2 events where competitors do not have an alternative like the 200m runners do.

[LuckySpikes]

Inconvenient truth: staging extra events only adds cost to the meet promoter and is unlikely to put many more butts in the seat. And the added cost is not insigificant, when you figure there's $30,000 in prize money required. Making up some numbers, for each of the 8 athletes you tack on $500 in airfare, so that's another $4000. Then figure 3 days of room & board at $200 per night, so that's another $4800, so in the blink of an eye you've added $40K to your cost of staging the meet.

I suspect most meet promoters are absolutely thrilled at having fewer events to contend with.

Boohoo.

My impression is that most of the meeting directors are primarily fans of athletics rather than just businessmen/women staging meetings as a money-making venture. So, I'm not so sure they'll actually be thrilled at having the core of their meetings cut by 25%. For one thing, it impacts the strength & depth of their "product" and makes it harder for them to justify their ticket prices.

[Conor Dary]

I could be wrong...but like Pre, meet promoters can have all the events they want.. I doubt this shortened program is being forced on anyone.... but what they want...

[Wiederganger]

Inconvenient truth: staging extra events only adds cost to the meet promoter and is unlikely to put many more butts in the seat. .

You get bums on seats by having the best athletes at your meet. Better still if you can showcase some head-to-heads. A great DL meeting t's not about the number of events, it's about getting the right events that are currently hot, be that in personality or standard.

You get the personalities at your meet, you win. You get an event which is having a purple patch, you win. You get an event with a great head-to-head, you win. Removing events ABC and only showing events D-Z is so short sighted if event A (e.g. Discus) and event B (e.g. TJ) are currently amazing with the potential for WRs and event C (e.g. 200m)is able to show mouth watering head-to-heads between the best in other events (100/400) who would otherwise not compete against each other. It's likes saying the mTJ is never exciting, when it most certainly is!

We are now in a situation where there is a possibility of WRs being broken in a number of events that are not being staged at a DL - mTJ; wTJ; mDT; w3000mSC. Which would be quite amusing.

The German meetings are successful because they choose to put on a restricted number of events where there are usually big German names (usually the throws...) or are the events they want to focus on/think they can get a medal (w4x100, for example.). But all events are basically equal, there is no special 'German event' that gets you extra points or rankings. So even if DLs are able to put on non-DL events as they always have, the missing events will never have the same gravitas from a points and presumably pay-day perspective. London may be able to showcase it's recently crownd World Champion Dina Asher-Smith, but her top competitors will be in the other event that gets them DL points. Great for the casual British fan, but when you move over the channel to the continent, the fans there are much more knowledgeable. Brussels will want to see fellow Low-Lands neighbour Schippers in the 200m. The Zurich fans will certainly want to see the fantastic DT and TJ. And just think of all those amazing DL/Golden League/GP clashes we have had at 200m over the years; Ashford v Drechsler in Oslo 86; Johnson v Fredericks Zurich 91 & Oslo 96; Felix v Schippers v Thompson in Brussels 15/16; Norman v Lyles in Rome....this year etc.

I'm also miffed by this supposed research they have done. How was the question asked? Just asking someone 'which are your favourite events?' is not the same as 'which events do you not want to see at a meeting'. Any event can be boring. The 100m can be boring if it's slow/has no major name/blanket finish & too hard to see who's won <delete as applicable to your taste> etc. Why anyone would think the m100m was more exciting than the m200m this season is beyond me.

I suspect most meet promoters are absolutely thrilled at having fewer events to contend with.

I think this is probably true, unfortunately. But as I said above, let each meeting have more control, let's not blanket 'ban' certain events.

[ATK]

Inconvenient truth: staging extra events only adds cost to the meet promoter and is unlikely to put many more butts in the seat. And the added cost is not insigificant, when you figure there's $30,000 in prize money required. Making up some numbers, for each of the 8 athletes you tack on $500 in airfare, so that's another $4000. Then figure 3 days of room & board at $200 per night, so that's another $4800, so in the blink of an eye you've added $40K to your cost of staging the meet.

I suspect most meet promoters are absolutely thrilled at having fewer events to contend with.

Do they actually have fewer events? I haven't counted but before each meet only had to deal with about half of the events as part of the DL. Now, unless I'm reading wrong, all meets will have ALL the events (except St, 200, DT, TJ).

[tandfman]

I think they generally all did all of the events, but only half of them were men's and half were women's. I assume that will continue to be the case--each meet will have 12 DL events, six men and six women, in addition to such other events as they may choose to hold. (Quite a few of them will have a 200 even though it's not a DL event.)