SPOTY

[larkim]

I don't know how this can be overcome for me, which does challenge my normally very liberal views!!

Matt

oh dear

Replying to this thread did make me think about my attitudes, which is a good thing! I have the utmost respect for anyone at all achieving (or appearing to achieve) the maximum from their personal potential. That's different from me actually wanting to watch it, or be engaged with their progress towards it.

In relation to my blatant (latent?) sexism, I am not alone. What is the "blue riband" (for most people!) event on the track at the OLG? Mens 100m. Wimbledon? Men's final. Football? Men's premiership. Cricket? Men's Ashes. Cycling? Men's Tour de France. I agree that part of the reason these events are put on a pedestal is old fashioned sexist ideas. But I also don't think it is inappropriate to recognise that in these areas the male performance at these sports is also the best human performance at these sports. Paula Radcliffe's WR compared to Patrick Macau's? Paula's time is exceptional (for a woman), astonishing, stunning. But the best the world has ever seen is Patrick's. His is the "world record", he is the fastest human to have covered a (IAAF certified) marathon course.

I also think that there are several sports which would benefit from the gender divide being merged - why on earth is lawn bowls played as male or female? Curling, golf, darts (!)... Why retain a gender divide, it only reinforces the "men are best" attitude. Some sports are fantastic at levelling the playing field. Equestrianism, sailing, both sports which are not without physical exertion, are gender neutral at the olympics. The best rider (& horse), the best yachtsperson wins the medal.

If a woman was sacked from her job for not being capable of managing the physical exertions of her job because she was female, that would (rightly) be regarded as sexism. But in sport, its OK to be slower, lower, less strong. And that's not sexist?

Matt

[SteveK26]

Here's my take on Spoty.
In general......
It has absolutely NOTHING to do with ''personality'', its a sports achievement award....always has been , always will be. (if it had anything to do with personality, Nigel Mansell would never have won).(nor Ryan Giggs for that matter).
Deciding it on a public vote is daft. You are always likely to get a bias in favour of the 'popular' sports like football.
It would be far better to be decided by a panel vote of the country's top sports writers; that would ensure a meritocracy result.

This year's nominees....
No women is a digrace and an insult to women's sport in this country.
One or two glaring omissions, of which Brownlee was probably the worst.Along with Adlington.
Lose one of the cricketers, one or two of the golfers, ....things could have been fair and balanced.

For what its worth..(probably nothing)..my idea of the winner this year (on merit) would be Clarke. Mo would be a very very close second.

[trickstat]

Larkim

A few points:

Apparently in bowls, men's greater range and power gives an advantage in, I think it's called "driving", when the bowler aims a powerful shot at the jack and the woods around it to effectively nullify an end that they are losing. A similar advantage may occur in curling.

In golf, men have an obvious advantage as they tend to be able to drive much further from the tee and have greater range with iron shots from the fairway.

Olympic sailing does have some gender-divided classes. I suspect someone with specialist knowledge could explain the particular advantages I suspect a man may have in the sport.

In all of the above sports though, I do suspect a woman international would be more likely to beat a good club-level man than in sports such as athletics.

[mump boy]

It wouldn't have even occured to me to enjoy a mens race more than a women's because the men run faster. It's all relative to the other people in the race

[sidelined]

It wouldn't have even occured to me to enjoy a mens race more than a women's because the men run faster. It's all relative to the other people in the race

Exactly. Larkim, if you can only enjoy sport when it's performed by the biggest and beefiest, then you are missing out. And by the way, I'm bored with the hype surrounding the men's 100m and my most anticipated event for the Olympics is the heptathlon...

[Exile]

It wouldn't have even occured to me to enjoy a mens race more than a women's because the men run faster. It's all relative to the other people in the race

I tend to agree with this. Likewise, I recall one of Dwain's initial comments after his positive test was that "nobody wants to see people running 10.0, they want to see 9.X". While it's true that seeing Bolt, Blake, Johnson and others run incredible times is really exciting, I find watching two or more people duking it out in a competitive race (regardless of gender or standard) just as entertaining or even more so. The 2003 men's 100m final may have been slow, but it was a better race than most others.

[larkim]

It wouldn't have even occured to me to enjoy a mens race more than a women's because the men run faster. It's all relative to the other people in the race

Exactly. Larkim, if you can only enjoy sport when it's performed by the biggest and beefiest, then you are missing out. And by the way, I'm bored with the hype surrounding the men's 100m and my most anticipated event for the Olympics is the heptathlon...

I don't think I ever said that that was what I *enjoyed* watching more, I think you've missed my point. In any competition, whether that be local, national, able bodied / paralympic, boys, girls, mens, womens, I fully agree - the joy of watching any sport is that of watching a contest between / amongst competitors.

I think all of us would agree that different sports appeal to us in different ways; personally, in addition to athletics I am a keen motorsport fan. I'm sure plenty of you wouldn't understand the appeal of spending nearly 2 hours watching cars go around a circuit on TV, but I assure you I find it rivetting and compelling! Some people will be compelled by watching weightlifting, it does nowt for me. Shot put? Male or female, I find it hard to get excited by it. Women's high jump? Personally, I enjoy that much more than mens. Wonder why...?

My point was about the sheer level of achievement, which I do perceive in absolute terms in a gender neutral way - as I've said, simply put men happen to be the fastest and strongest over just about any distance / event, and I think in a world which is sensitive about gender bias (and rightly so) we shouldn't lose sight of a rational perspective which recognises that. And to an extent (ignoring the points about Nuts magazine getting a vote!), SPOTY has just recognised that.

Matt

[paul]

Unfortunately I don't have time to get involved in this interesting thread at the moment,
although I am itching to.


Very briefly (all I have time to do is wind you up!
sorry):
I think that Dwain's old guilty-excuse comment about running sub-10 (which I assume none of us
would defend, even if we quite admire the reborn Dwain Mk II) is relevant on a number of levels.
The "absolute" fastest (to use that daft term) would not be "men" (certainly not me or you), but for many years would
admittedly have been _a_ man, namely the drug-fuelled Ben Johnson.
Or, if you want to get absolutely faster than drug-assisted Ben, try petrol-assisted Jeremy Clarkson in his Lamborghini, or a leopard.

back to work, paul.

[Guto Nyth Bran]

BBC Wales just announced the Welsh version of this award.
And the winner is.... Chaz Davies
Dai Greene didn't even make the top three.

For those who don't know, Chaz is the World Supersports Motorcycling champion.
The public know nothing

[Kermit]

The British Olympic Association is considering a boycott of the BBC's Sports Personality of the Year show, the last before the London Games, in protest at the lack of women on the shortlist.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/de ... intcmp=239

[Flumpy]

I'm bored with the hype surrounding the men's 100m and my most anticipated event for the Olympics is the heptathlon...

Mine's the w800m. I'm not that interested in the men's 100m at all. The women's should be far more exciting.

[fabolous]

Not that you need any but here's a few reasons why you should vote for Mo

http://www.athleticos.org/video/544352- ... -Best-Bits

[rembradt]

I cannot add much to Steve's post as it sums up my thoughts entirely about that SPOTY programme which I no longer watch as it represents all that I do not care for in the media coverage of UK sport.
People should not have a say on sport for the purposes of SPOTY, in respect of both the shortlist and the top 3 because in ninety percent of cases they know little, if anything, about the individual sports played by our men and women all over the world. The very great majority only know of Soccer,Rugby,Cricket,Horse Racing, Motor Racing, Snooker,Darts etc and not much else.

[Ursus]

The right result. Well done Mo, but a very worthy winner in Cav.

[Guto Nyth Bran]

The right result. Well done Mo, but a very worthy winner in Cav.

Full result
Mark Cavendish 169,152 (49.47%)

Darren Clarke 42,188 (12.34%)

Mo Farah 29,780 (8.71%)

Luke Donald 23,854 (6.98%)

Andy Murray 18,754 (5.48%)

Andrew Strauss 17,994 (5.26%)

Alastair Cook 13,038 (3.81%)

Rory McIlroy 11,915 (3.48%)

Dai Greene 9,022 (2.64%)

Amir Khan 6,262 (1.83%)

Not too shocked at who won but it's a massive margin between 1st and 2nd.

[rembradt]

Thank goodness this annual celeb magazine farce is over,which the BBC has turned it into. Cavendish performances was as team event as any and without his Tour de France team mates and particularly in the World Road Race Champs he would be nowhere much. A nice "engineered" event as far as the BBC is concerned.

[larkim]

That's a little harsh about Cav. Yes, there is a team around him performing a role, but to be consistently up there winning Tour stages and taking the world champs says you are the best at what you are doing. At the end of the day his sport is about undertaking an endurance feat for 4-5 hours, and then cracking past the finishing post a few cm ahead of your rival.

Most sports are a team event; Mo on his own is talented, but the training / coaching / physio / medical / etc teams are what give him the extra.

In terms of "celebrity", I don't think Cavendish ranks particularly highly, so all the more credit to him gaining the public's recognition of his achievements.

Matt

[Geoff]

It was the right result I think and the bookmakers got it spot on. Surprised about the winning margin though.

I didn't see all of the programme and may have missed an award or two but apart from Sir Bobby were the award givers all female? If so I'm not sure it quite rectifies the complaints over the all-male short list.

[Kermit]

Completely correct Geoff the bookies got it spot on because the marketing of Cavendish before the announcement of the nominations was more proactive than the other nine nominated. And there were more female award givers than ever before.

Unfortunately the event has lost it's sparkle due to the lack of sport shown by the BBC. Gone are the full reviews of each sports year, gone are the fun bits, it was boring.

Let's hope next year's event is better

[Geoff]

I met a coaching colleague the other day who I hadn't seen in a while who told me he had written a letter to AW complaining about the BBC's coverage of athletics. He received a reply from AW saying they had had a lot of similar letters but couldn't publish anymore for fear of jeopdising the BBC's broadcasting of the sport. The BBC had said (and this has been posted before) it is what the general public want. The inference was the BBC were not happy with too many complaints in AW and the magazine should tone it down.

This year's SPOTY seems to have thrown a spanner in the works and created a debate on media coverage of sport in general including minority sports, women's sport, disability sport and the grossly over the top and obscene amount of football coverage. Many of us believe the BBC are dumbing down sports broadcasting and, as Kermit posted, going down the celebrity route.

I hope it makes the BBC re-think their sports presentation strategy. We may even see a little more athletics action instead of a cosy sofa chat!

Finally, just had a quick look through the SPOTY awards and noticed three men helped with awards presentations but each one was accompanied by a sportswoman and in several cases there were two women presenting. A rather clumbsy attempt to try and undo some of the damage done?

[boysen]

320000 votes out of a TVsports viewing public that maxes out in excess of 10 million...a fair sample?

[trickstat]

Tried to vote for Mo several times on redial but didn't get through!

And yes I did check that I'd dialled the right number!

Not that I begrudge Cavendish the win TBH. The huge winning margin could be down to the campaigning of the Cycling Governing body/press.

Weird fact corner - probably the first time ever that none of the top three were born on the island of Great Britain.

[rembradt]

I have always thought that one of the great lies by all purveyors of media info,TV and the Press, is the statement that "we are giving the Public what they want". If the information and coverage is non existent, or pretty nearly so, then for sure people will not "want " other coverage because they are not aware of it and are cynically never given the opportunity to see, to read and to hear about other individual sports. The arrogance and the boastful self image of the overpaid Lords of the media militates against minority Sports,not that Athletics is a minority sport.

Propaganda and skilful marketing is the real message, and Cavendish certainly benefited from the same; he is not a great cyclist; he is a fine sprinter, lucky to have such wonderful supporting colleagues, his sacrificial domestiques; I watched the Tour de France every day and the guys I applauded were the cyclists who were top rate at time trials, mountains and not just sprinting ; Cav was nearly bumped out of the Tour as you will recall for being so far behind the top guys. I salute Cavendish's colleagues who delivered for him the World Road race Championships 2011.

The comment about Mo Farah also having a "team" is not a fair comparison to Cavendish because for all his unbelievable dedication in training Mo is on his own in a race; he does not have a couple of other British runners aiding and abetting him , as Kenyan and Ethiopian distance runners have in the past.

[Ursus]

Completely correct Geoff the bookies got it spot on because the marketing of Cavendish before the announcement of the nominations was more proactive than the other nine nominated.

Maybe, but nothing compared to McCoy the year before

Unfortunately the event has lost it's sparkle due to the lack of sport shown by the BBC. Gone are the full reviews of each sports year, gone are the fun bits, it was boring.

Don't disagree, although I thought it was a little better than some. Lineker & Barker are just too lightweight as presenters for my liking.

he is not a great cyclist; he is a fine sprinter

Usain Bolt is also a fine sprinter, but presumably not much of an athlete then as his hammer's a bit on the weak side?

I watched the Tour de France every day and the guys I applauded were the cyclists who were top rate at time trials, mountains and not just sprinting

And the year a Brit brings home the maillot jeune, will be the year that the SPOTY winning margin dwarfs last nights. Cycling - track and road - has captured the public imagination as we've got quite good at it.....

[djlovesyou]

Propaganda and skilful marketing is the real message, and Cavendish certainly benefited from the same; he is not a great cyclist; he is a fine sprinter, lucky to have such wonderful supporting colleagues, his sacrificial domestiques; I watched the Tour de France every day and the guys I applauded were the cyclists who were top rate at time trials, mountains and not just sprinting.

What about the climbers and their 'sacrificial domestiques'? Do you think Lance Armstrong won his 7 TDFs without having the climbing team of all teams? Cycling is a team sport, end of story, but every great team needs a great leader. Cavendish is just that. Also, you don't win Milan - San Remo and WCRR without being a great cyclist, simple as that.

I'm not a huge fan of the guy personally, I didn't much care for the HTC formula for stage wins, but that said, you can't doubt the guy's ability and his enormous achievements this year.

Deserving winner, no doubt about it. Don't let your lack of understanding of the sport cloud your judgment.

[rembradt]

Fine leader for the team. I don't buy it.!! Cav was largely a follower NOT a leader; he led over the last 200 metres on the Stages in the Tour that did not demand the gut wrenching stuff in the Alps etc, and in the time trials he was ordinary; clever marketing certainly got him some good public reaction.
How many of the great British public know anything about Le Maillot Vert...few I am certain. I think the reference to him as a great cyclist is a vast exaggeration. His win in the road Race Worlds was entirely down to the team and he had the good grace to acknowledge it.
Please dont let your judgement be clouded by the SPOTY nonsense. As for the paean of praise for Lance Armstrong... he is rightly regarded as a crummy cheat in many quarters, if not on this Forum.

[Laps]

Fine leader for the team. I don't buy it.!! Cav was largely a follower NOT a leader; he led over the last 200 metres on the Stages in the Tour that did not demand the gut wrenching stuff in the Alps etc, and in the time trials he was ordinary; clever marketing certainly got him some good public reaction.
How many of the great British public know anything about Le Maillot Vert...few I am certain. I think the reference to him as a great cyclist is a vast exaggeration. His win in the road Race Worlds was entirely down to the team and he had the good grace to acknowledge it.
Please dont let your judgement be clouded by the SPOTY nonsense. As for the paean of praise for Lance Armstrong... he is rightly regarded as a crummy cheat in many quarters, if not on this Forum.

rembradt you are showing a painful ignorance of the sport of Road Cycling.

By my reckoning SPOTY winners have included a dozen from team sports, mainly footballers and cricketers. Did Bobby Moore's lack of scoring in the World Cup make him a bad choice for SPOTY in 1966? In team sports the player has a job to do. Cavendish's job is a finisher. The team work for him and hold together because they know they have the best sprinter in the world to finish the job. If he wasn't the best sprinter he wouldn't win and nor would the team.

What team support do you think he would get if he didn't produce those wins? It is because he is the fast AND consistent AND a great team rider (in sprinting terms) that he has developed and kept that support.

In the same way Bobby Moore and Gordon Banks didn't score goals to win the 1966 World Cup, Cavendish doesn't win time trials or mountain stages. He does enough to stay in the stage races and conserve his energy for when it matters. That's his job.

[Kermit]

There were a few history makers on the list this year, none better than Luke Donald.

He achieved an extraordinary feat, but because he didn't have a campaign team he did very poor in the votes considering runner up was ..... a golfer.

[Geoff]

SPOTY still somehow manages to matter

A glitzy venue, famous names, a live studio audience, a public vote and then the culminating moment: "And the winner is..."

No, it's not X-Factor - although you'd be forgiven for thinking so after the description - it's the BBC Sports Personality of the Year broadcast. The two grow eerily more similar every year. Actually, SPOTY is just X-Factor with balls. Close your eyes, and you might just be able to picture the likes of Louis Lineker and Tulisa Barker steering you through the event's proceedings, which drip with self-congratulation and celebrity.

Even the confused voting system of the two shows mirrors one another. What's supposed to count: the sport or the personality? For every time you hear that criticism, think of the words: "But it's supposed to be a singing contest!"

The format tends to frustrate the dedicated sports fan, but evidently plenty of people do like it. In 2010 the show attracted a peak audience of 12.6 million people — the highest numbers since the 2003 edition.

http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/blogs/wor ... 47543.html

[chaz_78]

The show seems to become more and more about the campaigns than anything else and therefore is becoming predictable. I personally always root for the athletes as it's my favourite sport, I'm afraid cricket and golf don't interest me at all.

It's a shame Dai didn't finish a bit higher, I would certainly have him above Murray who was consistent but didn't actually win when it mattered the most. Unfortunately Dai is relatively unknown outside of us athletics fans and simply cannot compete against the likes of Murray who generates enormous publicity, win or lose.