The World Athletics Federation (WAF) became the first sport management organization in the 128-year history of the modern Olympic Games to award prize money to Olympic champions.
The World Athletics Federation is a "rising bird", and different sports have their own development characteristics, but not all associations will follow suit.
With the slogan of "seeking common ground while reserving differences, chatting about sports hot topics of common concern", "Community" is a weekly dialogue program launched by the Voice of China at 10:00 p.m. on Friday at 10:00 p.m. during the "Decisive Moment" column of the Voice of China.
In April, the World Athletics Federation announced plans to award $2.4 million from the IOC's revenue share to the champions of track and field events at the Paris Olympics. The World Athletics Federation will be the first sport governing body to award Olympic champions, with plans to reward all athletes who win medals in the future. On April 26, 2024, episode 157 discussed the new direction of commercial development of athletics. The three "gossips" who participated were Zhang Wen, a reporter from the Voice of China, Chen Chen, a track and field commentator and official announcer of the Chinese Athletics Association, and Luo Ranfeng, vice president of sports business marketing and general manager of Shengyi Interactive.
This article is an excerpt from the highlights of this episode.
01
Amateur principle of quitting for many years
Zhang Wen: Recently, the World Athletics Federation Diamond League was held in China for two consecutive weeks, which made domestic track and field fans addicted. Athletics, known as the "mother of sport", is set to set a new precedent by awarding US$50,000 to the gold medallists in each track and field event at Paris 2024, for a total of US$2.4 million. The World Athletics Federation became the first sporting organization to award gold medalists at the Olympic Games in the 128-year history of the modern Olympic Games.
Many people feel that the World Athletics Federation's move is "unconventional" because the money comes from the IOC's share of the official associations of the various sports, which should have been used to invest in the development of the relevant sports. The International Association of Individual Sports Federations (IASA) issued a statement expressing "concern" and "concern" about the World Athletics Federation's decision, which it considered to be a departure from the values of the Olympic Movement. What values do bonuses deviate from?
Luo Ranfeng: When Coubertin founded the modern Olympic Games, he advocated the so-called "amateur spirit". That is, all athletes participating in the Olympics should be amateur athletes, and they cannot use sports as a means of making a living. This line of thinking dominated the long history of the modern Olympic Games, and it was not until the 60s and 70s of the 20th century that it began to loosen. In particular, the Olympics themselves are actively engaged in commercial development, and the best athletes, who are usually professional athletes, participate in the competition, which is the biggest selling point of the Games. In this way, it is becoming more and more difficult to adhere to the amateur principle.
But there are also other philosophies that perpetuate the spirit of amateur sportsmanship. For example, although you are a famous professional athlete and even have a strong earning power in a sport with high commercial value, you come to the Olympics purely to show the Olympic spirit in a future scenario. So the World Athletics Federation bonus does change some traditions.
The Olympic Charter once required that non-amateur athletes should not participate in the Olympic Games
Zhang Wen: Article 26 of the Olympic Charter once stipulates that people who participate in sports should do it purely for physical and mental benefit, or some kind of social benefit, and not for direct or indirect material gain. The rules even require that athletes cannot train for more than two weeks last year, and if they receive subsidies from the government, schools, or commercial organizations because of their athletic talents, they cannot be considered amateur athletes.
But as Ran Feng said, the prosperity of the Olympic Games has brought competitive sports to a greater value and commercial value. "Career" becomes the support behind this commercial value, attracting more talented athletes. The Olympics insisted on being amateur and non-professional, and as a result, they ran into operational bottlenecks in the 80s of the last century, and after commercialization, it was naturally difficult to emphasize the purest amateurism.
02
World Athletics is willing to be a "bird"
Zhang Wen: Now the World Athletics Federation has gone one step further and wants to be the "first bird" to pay bonuses. Why did the World Athletics do this? or why did it become the first organization to do so?
Chen Chen: Let's first expand on the amateur principle. The 1992 Barcelona Olympics in which the American "Dream Team" basketball team played in the tournament had already announced that the amateur principle had been completely broken. In terms of Olympic track and field events alone, there are almost no amateur athletes in Olympic track and field athletes. Only in the group stage and the qualifying round, amateur athletes with wild cards may appear. In addition, in the past, the Athletics Federation announced the Olympic participation standards, setting A and B standards. Now there is no A or B standard, there is only one standard. The remaining criterion is to earn points by participating in professional events under the World Athletics Federation. Therefore, under the current World Athletics system, there is no longer the possibility that the Olympic athletes who are shortlisted for the Olympics are amateurs except for the wild card races.
According to World Athletics President Sebastian Coe, he hopes the IOC will welcome the initiative. Because the world has changed, the development of sports has to adapt accordingly. The Olympic Games are fundamentalistic, but they can only survive in the long term if they evolve with the times and incorporate new vitality.
Athletics is the absolute focus of the Olympic Games
Then let's go further and discuss the reasons for this by the World Athletics. One trigger is the influence of the World Athletics Federation. The World Athletics Federation (IAAF) is a founding member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which has voting rights not only in the IOC and the Association of Individual Sports Federations in the Summer Olympics, but also in 2015 when Beijing bid to host the 2022 Winter Olympics. In addition, the World Athletics Federation is also the single sports federation with the largest number of registered athletes in the world. Therefore, although the World Athletics Federation cannot be compared with FIFA or some other organizations in terms of specific income volume, it is still the world's largest single sports association in terms of its influence in the world sports and the number of registered athletes. Therefore, the "first bird" to be awarded by the World Athletics Federation is in line with the status of the World Athletics Federation, and even to a certain extent, the World Athletics Federation has an unshirkable responsibility.
Another factor is the current chairmanship's business reform mindset. Section took office in 2015 and has been working on a step-by-step basis to improve the commercialization of the World Athletics Federation. For example, expanding the specifications of the commercial league, independently launching the continental tour, indoor world tour, etc., in addition to the Diamond League, to expand the commercial plate by expanding the event system. Another example is to invest more funds to improve the commercial display effect of its events, so that the events have new upgrades in terms of broadcast effect and on-site viewing effect, and further stimulate the commercial pool of track and field. After a series of reforms are carried out, the next step is to come to the Olympic level and to the bonus support for Olympic champions.
03
Other associations will not follow easily
Zhang Wen: Will the athletics award champion lead to other sports to follow suit? Or is it only the World Athletics Federation that has the ability to do so?
Luo Ranfeng: I think there are two things to consider. The first is that the World Athletics Federation's own advantages are indeed great. At the Paris Olympics, the estimated share of the track and field event is $39.48 million. The $2.4 million share is a small percentage. Moreover, track and field, swimming and gymnastics are the three Olympic sports with the highest score, and track and field alone is about 8 million US dollars more than the share of swimming gymnastics, which is equivalent to 2.4 million as the standard. It can be seen that the income prospects of the World Athletics Federation are relatively ideal.
The second point is to consider the circumstances of each project. When Mr. Chen mentioned football, I don't think FIFA will do that, because FIFA's attitude towards the Olympics has always been very subtle. The same more professional sports, such as tennis, golf, etc., may be willing to pay bonuses. This is because the IOC-recognized governing organizations for these sports are not the most profitable organizations in the program. For example, the earning power of the International Tennis Federation is not as good as that of the ATP and WTA tours, and there are often top tennis players who do not participate in the Olympics. So for the International Tennis Federation, they may consider using prize money to attract athletes.
There are other projects that may be more complicated. Its operations itself rely on the quadrennial Olympic Games. These shares are indeed spent on the promotion of the project, and it may not be possible to set aside a special fund to pay bonuses to athletes. Especially for some so-called niche project associations, it is "not possible" to pay bonuses rather than "not wanting to". Overall, I think that whether or not other associations follow the World Athletics practice depends on the development of the corresponding associations, as well as the influence and earning capacity of the associations within the project.
The Diamond League is a daily channel for elite track and field athletes to compete for prize money
Picture: 2024 Yangtze River Delta International Track and Field Diamond Races
Chen Chen: From the perspective of media people, I have sorted out the reactions of the media at different stages after the news of the bonus was released on April 10. The first wave of media reaction was pure reporting, pointing out that the World Athletics Federation had such a decision, and there was no additional data or opinion output. Then there was CBC Canada's sports channel that spoke out in support of Coe's approach, arguing that Olympic medals have sentimental value, but sentimental value can't pay off your mortgage. The practice of the Section has helped to increase the visibility of athletics.
About 10 days later, there was a third wave of coverage, and there were some changes in the media tone, and more associations began to express their attitudes. For example, the International Cycling Union (FICF) has said that for cycling, top athletes are inherently gold-absorbing machines. Giving the most benefits to top athletes is not suitable for the development of cycling. FIBA directly said that we will not give bonuses to the champions. According to the Summer Federations Association and the IOC, the World Athletics Federation (IAAF) has taken the lead in raising the question of whether other sports will put pressure on the federations to which they belong.
Track and field athletes are also starting to speak out. Canadian 100m and 200m athlete Alan Brown believes it is hoped that all athletes who reach the individual finals will receive prize money. Giving bonuses only to those with the best results is detrimental to the development of the project. In addition, he also indirectly expressed a meaning, the World Athletics Federation's attempt to use the bonus as a lever to leverage the greater business prospects, is a bit "too small". He also hopes that track and field athletes will vote on such big events within the World Athletics Federation, rather than simply making decisions at the top of the board.
Overall, I think the World Athletics Federation has its own set of independent backgrounds for doing this. On the one hand, track and field have a need to promote career development, and the income of track and field athletes is lower than that of football, tennis, and cycling athletes. The World Athletics Federation needs more money to serve athletes well, and now it is leveraging more resources by handing out prize money. On the other hand, the 48 Olympic athletics events are all track events, except for race walking and marathon. In the current development of track and field events, there is a serious imbalance between the income of athletes in track events and road running. The prize money for the champion of the World Athletics Federation Gold Label Road Running Event is $40,000, and the Diamond League champion is only $10,000, and even if he wins the championship, it will be $30,000. There is also a need for the World Athletics Federation to do something to balance the difference in earnings between track and road running. Therefore, different projects have different professional development directions, and each association is also facing its own trivial and subdivided status quo, and there is no one-size-fits-all operation. This means that other associations will not easily follow the practice of giving out bonuses.
04
To send or not to send, there are still many questions......
Zhang Wen: As Mr. Chen said, whether to give bonuses to athletes is not only an issue for the association to consider, but also makes us aware of the differences in the development of different sports. For example, if a sport is highly commercialized, athletes receive more than other sports on average, and they may not be particularly motivated by the distribution of prize money at the Olympics. For example, in tennis, Djokovic and Nadal will say that putting their energy into the Olympics is the pursuit of the ultimate honor. At this time, their thinking is a bit back to the beginning of the international Olympic spirit, the so-called amateur spirit is not only a pure need for honor, but also hides the spiritual purpose of the leisure class after achieving financial freedom.
However, the commercial promotion of some sports on a global scale is not ideal, and athletes are in great need of exposure to the Olympic Games. If this exposure opportunity can bring them a certain bonus in addition to attention and traffic, it must be very valuable for them. Because the project is not as commercialized, any new revenue stream is valuable.
The third situation may be that like the World Athletics Federation and the World Swimming Federation, the association has a certain commercial development ability and the athletes have a certain reputation, but the overall commercialization of the sport is not as good as the business trip of football, basketball, tennis, and golf. At this time, the prize money is equivalent to a lever, and after being fed back to the athlete group, the athlete's motivation is also greater. So do they think the Olympics should give athletes financial incentives?
The dedication of the athletes has created great value for the Olympic Games
Luo Ranfeng: This type of controversy has lasted quite a long time in the sports world. The NCAA in American universities is very popular, but college athletes are not able to receive prize money or compensation. Now that the situation has eased somewhat, the income conditions of American college athletes have improved, including the realization of some image rights. The matter of bonus distribution is sometimes uneven rather than lacking. A group of people who create value, and another group of people who enjoy the benefits, are bound to contradict each other. In the face of increasingly fierce contradictions, there are only two outcomes in the end: either everyone will give up the profits, or one party will give up the benefits.
Therefore, I personally do not have a clear attitude on whether or not to pay bonuses, but I just point out that there must be a negotiation mechanism anyway. There will be no prize money, and there may be other ways to convert the Olympic halo into revenue. The same was true of the Olympic Games in ancient Greece, where athletes returned to their city-states with olive leaves and were rewarded with good fields and beautiful houses. If the IOC really encourages the Olympic spirit in the name of beauty, then the IOC must also explain clearly whether the IOC has really fully implemented these funds to support the Olympic Games and support the development of sports after the Olympic Games create so much commercial benefits.
Zhang Wen: You also reminded me of another problem, if you decide to pay bonuses, then how to pay them, to whom, and what is the distribution model, are all very grand questions. The IOC and the relevant individual committees need to go through rounds of discussions for this. What does Mr. Chen think?
Chen Chen: I'm quite supportive. This is mainly based on the fact that the Olympic Games have sponsors, and most of the national teams and athletes also have sponsors. These sponsors aim to use huge IPs like the Olympics to make a splash and then make some commercial claims. Since different sponsors have come into the Olympic scene in different forms, it means that the Olympic Games have inevitably created value. Obviously, this value should not be enjoyed exclusively, but should be shared by the participants who contribute to it. The distribution of all bonuses is also a mechanism to promote the openness and transparency of the distribution of benefits of the Olympic Games, so that the commercial value of the Olympic Games can be realized in a more reasonable and brighter scenario.
Zhang Wen: In fact, the IOC has also proposed to put athletes at the center after several rounds of reforms. I think that's a very important nucleus to keep the Olympic story going. So how to understand athlete-centeredness? Naturally, the improvement of athletes' voice, the mechanism for athletes to participate in more decisions, and the change in athletes' earnings. Thank you for both of you, and we'll see you next time.
Note: If not indicated, the pictures used in this article are from Osports