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#71
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FAI, soaring and Olympic Games
Soaring would be a fantastic Olympic sport. It would be great to see soaring get that kind of exposure. It would not be much more complex than the world championships are today. Of course all the racing should be in Grand Prix format ;-).
On Tuesday, August 17, 2004 5:19:38 AM UTC-4, iPilot wrote: It's been under discussion for several times, but I want to bring it up again. There have been several pro's and con's towards soaring in Olympics, but nobody argues that it'd rise the popularity of the sport. So it is important for soaring community. Therefore my question is following: Wich way is soaring worse than sailing? None of the cities that have organised Olympic games in the past would have any geographic troubles on organising soaring competitions (Moscow had troubles with organising sailing competition which had to be held in Tallinn - 900 km away). None of the latest summer games that I remember have had such miserable weather that the competition would have to be left unheld. The main argument against soaring is the fact that equipment can make a difference here. Well. Here is the challenge for igc. They have to face that their first trial of monoclass failed and they have to try again. This time with relatively high-performing, yet still not expencive standard or 15m class design. As a matter of fact I don't believe that sailing deserves to have 9 different classes on Olympics and soaring none. I personally think that FAI has failed bigtime to find the concensus amongst all air sports to get air sports represented on Olympic games. It shall be the biggest argument towards Olympic Commety - there's no air sports in Olympics nowadays. And the most suitable sport would be soaring because it's competitive, not so dependent on equipment and directly measurable. Making soaring TV-friendly shall not be a problem as well today. And with racing tasks only allowed on olympics it shall be understandable for general public as well. How can we do it? Regards, Kaido |
#72
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FAI, soaring and Olympic Games
On Tuesday, August 17, 2004 12:05:15 PM UTC-4, wrote:
How was gliding presented in the 1936 Olympic games? Perhaps that could be the marketing hook: make Hitler's dream a reality! Make gliding an olympic sport! that's sick. |
#73
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FAI, soaring and Olympic Games
On Tuesday, August 17, 2004 9:33:12 PM UTC-4, CLewis95 wrote:
While soaring is a sport, and it is competitive, I have a real hard time viewing the participants as athletes. If you can sit in a lounge chair for hours on end, playing Nintendo with a joystick, you've got the athletic stamina and dexterity to be a gold medal soaring pilot. I don't think you will get a single serious racing pilot in the world to agree with this assessment. Curt Lewis - 95 USA agreed! |
#74
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FAI, soaring and Olympic Games
On Wednesday, August 18, 2004 8:34:56 PM UTC-4, Stewart Kissel wrote:
SNIP- To promote our sport we need to be positive, and to exploit technology and creativity to present it to viewers as the exciting, challenging and adrenalin pumping sport that it is. SNIP Without sounding too snide, I would think submarine racers might say the same thing about there sport...and it could very well be true. But translating that to outsiders is a different issue. Face it, if most soaring pilots are not interested in watching sailplane races...I suspect the general TV viewing population might find it a tough sale. i feel like if there were glider races on tv just like there is golf on the golf channel, every damn one of us would tune in. |
#75
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FAI, soaring and Olympic Games
On Thu, 03 Jul 2014 13:18:36 -0700, ND wrote:
On Tuesday, August 17, 2004 9:33:12 PM UTC-4, CLewis95 wrote: While soaring is a sport, and it is competitive, I have a real hard time viewing the participants as athletes. If you can sit in a lounge chair for hours on end, playing Nintendo with a joystick, you've got the athletic stamina and dexterity to be a gold medal soaring pilot. I don't think you will get a single serious racing pilot in the world to agree with this assessment. Curt Lewis - 95 USA agreed! Getting your head around what Sports Administrators consider to be a sport can be hard. I was heavily involved in competitive Free Flight model flying when we were getting airsports recognised by the UK Sports Council (its been a good deal for gliding too, but I digress). The SAs were unconvinced that Free Flight was a sport (during each of the seven one hour round in a day you make a flight, which usually involves lobbing it up in a wind, following it downwind, retrieving it from anything up to two miles away and getting back in time to fly again in the next round. There's a scoring limit of 3 minutes of these flights. Then, if more than one flyer has a perfect score, they get to do more flights that evening with the scoring times increasing for each flyoff until there is a winner. The SA view was that there was little sporting prowess involved in getting the model trimmed, lift picking or launching into lift and that the effort involved in retrieving models after each flight was irrelevant to the sporting performance. However, they were more than happy to agree that standing and twiddling the sticks on an RC transmitter or spinning on the spot while controlling a control line model were obviously worthy sporting skills. On that basis I'd say that piloting a glider is most definitely a sport. -- martin@ | Martin Gregorie gregorie. | Essex, UK org | |
#76
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FAI, soaring and Olympic Games
What did you all think about the recent Soaring International article (Nov, 2016 issue) on the value of re-starting the sport of glider racing in the Olympics. I for one think this would be very, very smart with minimal downside.
Sean |
#77
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FAI, soaring and Olympic Games
On Sunday, October 30, 2016 at 6:40:30 PM UTC-4, Sean wrote:
What did you all think about the recent Soaring International article (Nov, 2016 issue) on the value of re-starting the sport of glider racing in the Olympics. I for one think this would be very, very smart with minimal downside. Sean Pointless. Having your sport in the Olympics is just about ego. How many new sailors does the Olympics produce? Probably not many and sailing gets a boost because sailing can get Jr into a better college than his academics warrant. And sailing is something normal people and likely someone you know has done. Gliding is a freak sport done by eccentric freaks in funny hats. Doubt any of the freak sports that are included get a boost from the Olympics. Best way to increase gliding participation would be to hire product researchers with a reliable personality scale(not the ones on social media) give it to multi decade soaring obsessed and see what populations share their proclivities. Plenty of people that would love soaring but they aren't airplane pilot types, don't know that they would love soaring and thus only a handful find soaring by luck. |
#78
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FAI, soaring and Olympic Games
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#79
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FAI, soaring and Olympic Games
I'm sorry to hear you react negatively to this.
Actually, Olympic sailing motivates many, many thousands of junior sailors worldwide to focus on the goal of qualifying for the Olympics. And this has a significant impact on youth sailing programs in the USA (massive growth) over the past 5-10 years, High School sailing teams'(growing rapidly in the USA over the past 10 years) and college sailing teams which have grown moderately. The US Sailing (SSA of sailing) effort to grow youth and high school sailing is directly related to Olympic sailing. They recruit and fund the US Jr Olympic development team and the side effect is that it provides the US as much larger pool of talent to develop. Thousands of kids have this in mind as they progress into the sport at early youth levels. I say competition is good. At all levels. This adds to the growth and keeps kids in the sport longer. The Olympics are a big deal to kids. It's recognizable. Little about the sport of gliding is. Gliding, especially in the US, is really poor when It comes to developing youth interest. As an organization the SSA has nearly hit rock bottom in this function. In fact, it may already be a lost cause. But Europeans and other FAI countries would probably enjoy an Olympic event to shoot for. But they don't appear to be working very hard for it either. The Olympics would hurt nothing. But being part of the Olympics is a huge deal for many sports. Especially small ones. The initial upside of a new Olympic category for gliding is high when compared to to low cost of supporting the Olympic test event (the first step in this process). If successful, Gliding could be re-introduced into the Olympics. That would provide an opportunity for great exposure (major media, nationalistic pride, youth interest, exposure otherwise impossible) for the sport, especially outside (key) of the current demographics (tiny). That would be good, if not great for soaring. I'm personally very positive about this idea. I find it curious that the FAI and IGC have not pursued this any further. It seems like a no brainer really. The FAI is trying to do it from scratch with SGP, for example. Very difficult. But the Olympics has a massive pre-built audience to tap into. If you combined the two fomats, it could get a massive boost. It would also be great for the sailplane manufacturer who is selected to build the gliders selected for the Olympic gliding competition. Sales of dozens of new gliders would be likely. Perhaps hundreds. And, of course, it would be damn fun for the athletes/pilots and fans. Soaring has an exceptional visual appeal and "exoticness" that is second to none. And soaring would also be the only aviation sport in the Olympics. I would be surprised if paragliding or hang-gliding doesn't win the race however as we have wasted tons of time doing nothing, or have already given up apparently. Maybe it's time to make another proposal? |
#80
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FAI, soaring and Olympic Games
How many SAT points is being a potential Olympic sailor worth? College admissions is the driver. Same reason kids play lacrosse. No such luck for soaring. The Olympics won't drive new starts, the freak sports in the Olympics get nil coverage. You have to watch them on youtube, and the sports are already on youtube. Which is great, we don't need to be in the Olympics to get coverage for our sport. Find a social media ace to promote the SGP. Or sell the SGP to a soda company.
On Sunday, October 30, 2016 at 10:37:41 PM UTC-4, Sean wrote: I'm sorry to hear you react negatively to this. Actually, Olympic sailing motivates many, many thousands of junior sailors worldwide to focus on the goal of qualifying for the Olympics. And this has a significant impact on youth sailing programs in the USA (massive growth) over the past 5-10 years, High School sailing teams'(growing rapidly in the USA over the past 10 years) and college sailing teams which have grown moderately. The US Sailing (SSA of sailing) effort to grow youth and high school sailing is directly related to Olympic sailing. They recruit and fund the US Jr Olympic development team and the side effect is that it provides the US as much larger pool of talent to develop. Thousands of kids have this in mind as they progress into the sport at early youth levels. I say competition is good. At all levels. This adds to the growth and keeps kids in the sport longer. The Olympics are a big deal to kids. It's recognizable. Little about the sport of gliding is. Gliding, especially in the US, is really poor when It comes to developing youth interest. As an organization the SSA has nearly hit rock bottom in this function. In fact, it may already be a lost cause. But Europeans and other FAI countries would probably enjoy an Olympic event to shoot for. But they don't appear to be working very hard for it either. The Olympics would hurt nothing. But being part of the Olympics is a huge deal for many sports. Especially small ones. The initial upside of a new Olympic category for gliding is high when compared to to low cost of supporting the Olympic test event (the first step in this process). If successful, Gliding could be re-introduced into the Olympics. That would provide an opportunity for great exposure (major media, nationalistic pride, youth interest, exposure otherwise impossible) for the sport, especially outside (key) of the current demographics (tiny). That would be good, if not great for soaring. I'm personally very positive about this idea. I find it curious that the FAI and IGC have not pursued this any further. It seems like a no brainer really. The FAI is trying to do it from scratch with SGP, for example. Very difficult. But the Olympics has a massive pre-built audience to tap into. If you combined the two fomats, it could get a massive boost. It would also be great for the sailplane manufacturer who is selected to build the gliders selected for the Olympic gliding competition. Sales of dozens of new gliders would be likely. Perhaps hundreds. And, of course, it would be damn fun for the athletes/pilots and fans. Soaring has an exceptional visual appeal and "exoticness" that is second to none. And soaring would also be the only aviation sport in the Olympics. I would be surprised if paragliding or hang-gliding doesn't win the race however as we have wasted tons of time doing nothing, or have already given up apparently. Maybe it's time to make another proposal? |
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