Europe is fading, in the United States, athletics has shrunk into an eternal minor sport. New, necessary growth can be found in Asia, writes Pekka Holopainen.
If a little splash of humor is allowed at the beginning? Pakistan Athletics Federation President, Maj. Gen Muhammad Akram Sahiait is certainly not settled that the officer and gentleman would have sent athletes to the World Championships in Budapest on too light a basis.
Pakistan only rewarded on the race trip Arshad Nadeem, who opened his season in javelin qualifying and capped off his season on Sunday with World Championship silver. If the medals are taken as a yardstick, the Pakistani team succeeded in Hungary with one hundred percent, Finland’s 40-member team with 2.5 percent.
Tongue in cheek
I emphasize that this is written a bit tongue in cheek.
The number one Olympic sports star of Pakistan’s neighbor – and blood enemy – India Neeraj Chopra has now won Olympic gold, World Championship gold and World Championship silver in three years and become a multi-millionaire. Not the funniest from a guy who hasn’t broken the 90 meter mark.
Before going into the above in more detail, let’s take a moment to look at the medal table of the World Championships. The superior United States single-handedly washed the entire European Union, and if the figures were to include the women and men of the Caribbean who were de facto elite athletes in the USA, the old continent’s kart bath would be harsh.
From the strongholds of Europe, next year’s Olympic host France took their first medal, the men’s long relay silver. Germany was catastrophically left without a medal. It was also difficult for a few other traditional forts of the sport.
The trend is especially clear from the point of view of absolute top athletics. Europe is still the most important continent for track and field sports, but it has a cloak of fading people wrapped around its shoulders in the big picture. In the USA, the few compilation broadcasts of the TV giant NBC gathered audiences of less than a million viewers, the broadcasts of other rights holders even more pathetic numbers. They say it all.
No growth in the US
The USA still and always produces the best top athletes thanks to its university system, but athletics in the country will never grow this big, except for the short boosts of the Olympic years.
When a traditional species seeks growth, the eye must turn to the only air direction that offers it, i.e. east. The double victory of India and Pakistan was the best thing that could have happened to the whole sport in the javelin final.
The next World Cup will be held in Tokyo in 2025, but the more current destination may slowly be New Delhi.