Otago Running

Just testing the word "cirventing" again. Last time it reverted to "cirventing". Is there some sort of filter here, dc? Hope it works this time, if not, then very few will know what word I am trying to input. If it does work, then it is all good.

I was shocked to hear that Dunedin (Otago) gets probably the most publicity for its major athletics events, week in week out. What is wrong with those other centres? You have got to get in the face of the media. It is not a favour they are doing anyone. It is their duty to provide coverage of major sporting events. There is no government agency that is doing it. If the existing news organisations though monopoly are not doing their chore job, then another organisation should step in and do it properly. Why does athletics have to be one of the sports settling for second best. All kudos to ODT for doing more than the other centres news organisations, but it is still not a favour, it is their job. Browno, yes it is interesting to read the before and after articles on some weekend athletics event and then comparing them on the Monday. You can also add the extra dimension of spotting the number of mistakes. We could have a competition here. So we settle for 80% accuracy because that is the level we set our standards to. What if that 20 percent each week change what actually happened? We perhaps could have a special fiction section of the newspaper and put the article in there. When I got paid to do data communications installations from 1975 to 1989, I was paid an average salary to not make mistakes. We still made mistakes, everyone did, but we did our utmost to improve ourselves every time we did and learn from them. Journalists whether they are doing small sports articles or major ones, are paid to do them. So they should work extra hard to make sure that they are correct. I make mistakes doing the Leith website, but I am not paid to do it, however I do try my best to limit them and correct them and take on board any criticism levelled at me. At the moment doing this post prevents me from finishing the factual (maybe boring) reports on each race in the Ponydales - yes they did take place in Otago. It also prevents me from upping my mileage to 20km a week which is all that is required to beat Crossey. Well, Crossey it is not moaning, it is pointing out something that needs to be addressed. I sent a post to the relevant publication mentioning only the incorrect name of the event - it wasn't a moan it just pointed out the ommission. I wasn't concerned about the non-reporting of the master grades or junior grades or even some of the other errors.
Just talking generally, if we accept that we are third class in the world of sports reporting, then we will remain third class in terms of numbers and quality athletes participating. So we say everything should stay the same, we have had this for the last 30 years, lack of comprehensive media coverage in New Zealand? We are happy with it? So every thing is hunky dory? Maybe this also a contributing factor to the low number of senior athletes registered? We need to get some passion into the sport and how it is marketed to the public. General readers need to know what it feels like to squelch into the mud or slip down a hill in a cross-country race. The visual is not there in many articles but you have got to have the word smithery to portray the battle against the elements. Now I think with the advent of Facebook, Twitter, Google+, websites etc etc a lot of publicity for running can be done by cirventing the standard news publications - they are not as dominant as before. I heard that some Facebook page mentioned that the Hill City Women's team had broken the record at the Ponydales, before I had even put it up officially on the website - wow, that was good. Some of our journalists are not even online, but a lot of current information, especially the names and details of events are online only. All journalists today should be internet savvy, if not for themselves, then at least for their readers and the events that they are reporting on. It is like never using the phone or radio 40 years after they were invented but being involved in conveying information to other people. Well I have spoken, and now it is time for me to make love in a kind of off way.

Agree; we are lucky we get so much coverage. Perhaps harder training by some would leave less energy for moaning

Otago be thankful for the amount of coverage you get - between Wayne and Ali the ODT gives more coverage to crosscountry and T & F than the rest of the country's papers put together. A Monday report of the Otago Centre T & F meet gets more space than what the Herald gave to the NZ Champs in Auckland; a winter Monday's edition has more words on the local crosscountry races than the Press gave to the nationals when they were in Chch. Otago athletics is well served by the ODT and a few flights of fancy and inaccuracies can be forgiven.

Do any other centres in NZ actually get a write up of cross country relays? The last one in Christchurch was when they still referred to Don Grieg as Don Grieg Jr.

Newspapers of the ODTs readership are essentially written for the masses. Most people in reality only really care about the "top results". In most daily newspapers athletics doesn't even get a mention whilst the ODT provides a preview and after race review of pretty much every event. If people are specifically interested in the masters results they can just look at the results section of the newspaper!

I do agree with Biltong regarding the naming of the event being incorrect. However, 'Otago Cross Country relays' seems to be only attributed to the photo caption whilst in the article it was named "cross-country relays at the Dunedin Pony Club ". Would have been easy enough to insert a "Leith" in there.

steveday, why have up repeated yourself? The story written doesn't actually do any justice as to what the results say. I used to do harrier reports for my hometown paper and it was hell of a lot better written than what we have here in Otago.
Writing a story in which there is only one full strength team competing as was the case in the open women's grade, and spinning it out to make it sound like something else is pathetic 'journalism'

Skillo - I think you'll find it was phone hacking and close ties to senior police officers and politicians that brought down News Of The World. Last time I met him, Wayne Parsons barely knew how to operate his own phone, let alone hack into anyone else's. And your point regarding masters grades deserving more coverage because they make up the bulk of results doesn't withstand scrutiny - there are more people in NZ who play under 8s club rugby than there are who play for the All Blacks, but it is right that the ABs get more coverage than the Kaikorai Valley Ligers. The elite races (mens and womens) should be the focus of most articles, unless there's a good reason otherwise (human interest stories, etc).

I think Grant makes an excellent point re: the relative strength of Masters athletes at the moment, and it must be something the sport should be worried about. It's not a new issue, but it certainly doesn't appear to be going away.

Steveday, reporters will inevitably make mistakes. However, calling an event by some other name is not good journalism. It is disrespectfull to the organisers of the race, who spend a lot of time and effort in making this race one of the best events in cross country running in Otago. We don't go calling the Hill City - University Lovelock Relays, the Otago Lovelock Relays or even the South Island Lovelock Relays in an effort to make it relevant to non-informed readers. You call the event exactly what it is. Wayne knows full well what the name of the event is - he has reported on it for years. Why suddenly does it become the Otago Cross Country Relays? Everyone in harrier running in Dunedin & many in Otago know them as the Ponydales or Leith Cross Country Relays. They used to be called the Wesleydales when they were held out at the Wesleydale course. There are many people connected to the masters runners in Otago and these people ARE interested in reading about how these grades fared, believe me. You report on what is happening in an event. I have no problem with the main report being on the Open grades and that is how it should be as they are the ones doing the best times and the ones who are Olympic contenders. However, a mention of the masters and some junior grades in the article would have provided readers with more information on what went on. Another thing, is there was no mention of the weather AND course conditions, a very important ingredient of cross country running. I am not saying it was a bad report, in fact most of it was very good and interesting reading. If the article had been in a national news headlne, then I would agree with you, just report on the open grades, but the report was in a local newspaper in the sports section and hardly headline news.

It is probably important here to draw a distinction between what is important and what is news. It seems to me the ODT article is a good journalism. Parsons extracts from a wide range of information a single story with an interesting local angle. If anything there is too much information - due to writing about two races rather than one - rather than too little. Journalism can't be a list of facts without context - such as the place getters of every race. It has to have a narrative. Dubbing the event the Otago cross-country relays, rather than Leith Harriers Ponydales gives readers who do not follow athletics closely some context.
My perspective is that national level media outlets would normally primarily be covering elite sport -that is, in most cases, the winners of the senior women's and men's races. And local media would normally focus on the stories that don't run national but are still of interest to locals because they are proximate, unusual, prominent or have emotional human interest. The ODT probably sits somewhere in the middle of those two categories. Masters races like any athletics races will be news when they have an element that makes them proximate, unusal, or of human-interest relevance to local readers - but simply because they were run and had a good turnout.
That does leave a journalism gap though for important issues that are not ‘news’ - such as the growing importance of masters runners. To me those issues should be dealt with by doentary, feature articles or specialist interest spaces like this - NZRun.

Dotcom, it should be reported because the over whelming majority of fields and registrations are with masters runners, and in many instances, the quality of the masters running is much better than the seniors. You might not find it relevant because you still have a senior men's thinking mentality.

Skillo, an interesting point about mentioning the Masters grades. Would a report about Senior rugby games report on the kids or the golden-oldies game being played on the field alongside?
Although it's a great part of our sport that different ages and different levels compete in the same events on the same courses, should it be mandatory that all of the races be included in a race report, or could regional media articles focus on the key Senior events alone?
No strong opinion on this, but have thought about why newspapers and Athletics NZ always try to be so inclusive with their reporting when it is rare in other sports to see major outlets combining the different levels of a sport in articles. Perhaps a strength or a weakness of our sport?? - dc

Race through Waynes eye's : http://www.odt.co.nz/sport/athletics/209995/athletics-caversham-makes-it-four-senior-mens-titles-row

Cavey SM got up despite only having two of there top six from Lovelocks in the team.
HCOU took the women's Title convincingly. With Kirsty joining them from Leith and the uni girls joining/amalgamating the SW team could be a force on the national scene later in the season.

Cheers Skillo.

The race through Ali's eye's. http://www.odt.co.nz/sport/athletics/208221/athletics-team-effort-gets-caversham-home#

Great day out, great racing from Ariki taking it to the Cavey A team from the gun.
Any idea who the last team to break 25mins was? CU?