How media influences sport

Watching replays we Improve our knowledge and understanding. Participation In sports covered by the media Is always higher than for those that are not. This amount of sports coverage can have positive and negative effects. The first ever Olympic games that were televised were the 1936 games, held In Berlin, Germany, were televised by means of closed circuit television to various viewing halls located across the city. Media coverage of sport helps athletics to have the money to pay to have their rights to show the sporting events on the television.

Also athletics being hon.. On the television helps the athletes to gain sponsorship, sponsors such as Aids or Lola who sponsor the Olympic gold medalist Jessica Nines would have seen Jess’ potential as an athlete and approached her manager to ask for her sponsorship. Thus giving Jessica money through her sponsors. If there was a ‘face’ of London 2012, Ennui’s is It, and it’s not something she feels particularly comfortable with. She says she felt embarrassed when she went to her local newsagents and saw herself on the cover of a row of glossy magazines.

Jess was being promoted by esters, television adverts and anything that the media could put her face on to promote the Olympics. Even In the Olympic village there was no escape for Nines, she was constantly being asked for photos from foreign athletes or to sign things. Jess was constantly in and out of press conferences as everyone wanted to hear what the face of the Olympics had to say. She gave very little away but spoke well, with a nod and a smile at the end of every sentence. Competitors started to see the pressure she was under.

To some extent that extra pressure had been created by Team Nines ND the desire to market her. Could she live up to all that love the nation had shown here is what people wondered before the 2012 Games. So why would she do this if its added pressure and almost an embarrassment to see her face everywhere? The career of a athlete Is short lived, to make the most of their career they most make the biggest profile for themselves as possible In the short amount of time. In the Olympics Lola loved her, so used It to sell moisturizer. Jaguar praised her speed and grace and supplied a black five-litter car.

Omega took care of her time-keeping needs. Powered, BP and Aviva put their money behind her. Aids gave her a deal said to be the most lucrative of any Team KGB athletics competitor, at IEEE,OHO. So just from the one competition she has managed to gain a awful lot of sponsorship and money. Athletics has a range of deferent events within the sport, each having different rules in which the athletes must abide by. The media give you an idea about these rules because each and every person will witness athletics on the television or read about it in the newspaper.

From this people are able to analyses and evaluate the event and main an understanding of the event. For example, a person may pick up the rule the he atheist begins the running events from a gun start. The event that receives the highest amount of media coverage at the Olympics games other then the Olympic opening and closing ceremony, was Susan bolt winning the mom finial. Susan Bolt’s with the Jamaican historic gold in the 200 meters final taking eighth place in the London games top 10. However, Jamaica may have had an amazing time in the Olympics winning May gold medals but now they are in the media for a different reason.

Safe Powell, the former mom world record holder, was the biggest name to test positive, but four others, including Bowel’s training partner Sharon Simpson, the Olympic relay gold medalist, also failed tests at the country’s national trials in June. Both Powell and Simpson claim they took supplements that might have been contaminated with the banned stimulant Chlorine. This was a big shock o the world of athletics and changes all opinions of the Jamaican athletics team, making people not look up to them as role models anymore.

Another constructive effect the media has on athletics is it helps to improve the articulation levels at grass roots as these people that enter at grass roots will have witness elite athletes in athletics being promoted as role models by the newspapers. This use of a role model is the reason athletics has 1 million new athletes start each year. Once a athlete has started they can only keep working their way up the performance pyramided to be exactly like their role models. Athletics can be a huge inspiration on people’s lives through the media of television.

Many people don’t have the chance to watch sport on satellite television as there is normally a subscription e or a form of payment. Terrestrial television can bring athletics to those who have no access to satellite TV for one reason or another. People that won’t normally see athletics, get the chance to watch it and be inspired. Once inspired, anybody may then be encouraged to get involved into athletics and see how much of an amazing sport it really is. But what about when television isn’t an option?

There are a variety of other forms of media that promote sport, such as; newspapers, radio, books or the internet. A radio channel radio five live is a commentary and chat show. During the Olympics this radio station covered every inch of the Olympic Games so when you were driving on the way to and from work you never had the chance of missing a single bit of the 2012 games. Another great form of media is the internet, this is starting to get more and more popular over the years as technology advances. We have a range of different social media options with in Olympic athletes can use to help promote their image.

Jess Nines uses the social media site Twitter this allows the athlete to share a bit more of themselves with friends and fans, while teaching hem to behave responsibly and act as an ambassador and role model that she is. Also, by Jess being on the twitter it will benefit her sponsors; fans that follow their favorite athletes on social media are 55% more likely to purchase a brand if an athlete mentions it on twitter Have you ever watched athletics and seen Lawrence Kooky do a very technical spin before launching a discus?

And thought- I’d love to know how to do that? Through the new technology of the media, we have the ability to go back to that moment and watch it over and over again to look at each and every event, before that throw. We can stop and start our television screens on whatever movement we want to see; hence we have our visual guidance from the professional. Therefore, we can take it to the next level and give it ago. This way, the media has managed to make itself its own coaching aid, so we can use it to help us with our athletics.

For example, Sky HAD sports allows you to watch your favorite watch over and over again to see those techniques in action. However, it could be argued that media doesn’t always help athletics. To start with, athletics is a popular port but it seems to still in the shadow of other sports such as: football or rugby. Therefore, it does not get as much attention through the media, such as terrestrial television. Also, we have two very negative, yet different, effects that the media has on athletics. The first being- lack of attendance to live events- take the 2012 Olympics for example.

The BBC had said that It sold 7 million tickets to people all around the world, but this was only 80% of the total amount of tickets that they wanted to sell. You may be thinking only 80%? Well it comes down to the media! Every single event at he Olympics was shown on terrestrial and satellite TV, therefore many people chose to watch the events from the comfort of their own home rather than purchase tickets and watch the events live from the different venues. This led to a reduced number of tickets sold and people experiencing the atmosphere and witnessing the sports live.

What was amazing though was the support for the face of the Olympics Jess Nines because on day 1 as she started the crawl two days competing in seven different events in the heptathlon there was a full crowd at the Olympic stadium who came to support her on the opening day of her events. This Just shows how much of an impact Jess had on the Olympics, for a time unusual to see the stadium full- it was jam-packed! Everyone wanted to see this girl compete. She is something special. The second being often the media can over load us with sport on television.

Using the Olympics again as a great example- the month that it was on- everywhere you looked, people would be watching the Olympics, listening to the Olympics, talking about the Olympics and thinking about the Olympics. This could be argued-overload. By the time that it had got to half way through the Olympic period many people could abate that seeing another Olympic event was becoming tedious. The media were trying to use the Olympics to get people into sport, when really it could be seen as forcing people to be interested in sport.

The media pushed and pushed that the Olympic Games legacy was it would leave behind for the host city new and upgraded sports facilities and venues. This would create more Jobs, more area for recreational activities and the chance for people to develop into the next athletic star. Carrying on with the media overloading us with sport there were various campaigns set up to peep us involved and interested by the Olympic Games. Nikkei created a television campaign called find your greatness’.

They created an ad that showed people from all over the world participating in sports in cities that happened to have London in their name, including London, Ohio, London, Norway, and East London, South Africa. McDonald’s, a huge fast food brand known all around the world decided in America they would promote the Olympics by offering when you purchase items that have under 400 calories, you can win prizes, some as big as 25,000 dollars and a trip to London. The way it works? An American athlete’s name appears on all food items that are less than 400 calories, and if your Olympic athlete wins a gold medal, you win a prize.

You may not think of McDonald’s to be the best Olympic sponsor as most of its food isn’t exactly suitable for a training athlete. Nevertheless, McDonald’s best target audience wasn’t necessarily athletes, but they were able to create an Olympics campaign that caters to their customer base nonetheless. Often it can feel that the example, in a previous Olympics, the marathon was run at a time which suited TV impasses, even though it was at the hottest time of day! The organizers had no control over when the event was run because they wanted it to suite them.

Finally, the media does have an interest in promoting British athletics and other national governing bodies for sport as they are showing high profile sporting events more and more, whereby people can become encouraged to take part in these sports. However, they must be aware of overloading prime time television slots which could have a negative impact on young sports people of the future Also in this report I want to look t not only the positive and negative effects the media has on sport but ways in which the media can improve our modern sport. The media’s improved Olympics over the years. 0-50 years ago most fans would have to wait until the next days papers came out to find out the scores of the day before games. Or they might have access to the radio. The increase in televising the Olympic Games has brought more fans as they are able to follow their favorite Olympic event more closely. Over the years technology has increased to the point where even if your team is not on the television, you can still et up to the second game details through the internet. The media has been the driving force for certain changes in the game as well.

For instance the ability to have the world record line run across the pool on our television as the Olympic swimmers travel through the water, has come from the media complaining the swimming wasn’t exciting enough as we didn’t know what they were fighting for. So now allowing for the possibility of seeing the world record line. The media, by exposing events, teams and athletes more intimately to the public have brought many more fans to the Olympic Games and allowed the Games to drive p the costs of attending a game and in essence that is partly why the facilities are so ridiculously outstanding.

The media can account for another reason for outstanding facilities, they have so many commentaries and editorials about every event that the athletes compete in, giving more exposure and their sponsors use this perceived popularity to help them in getting more money. There has been an influence in creating and then helping to correct problems as well. Steroids is a perfect example. In the Olympic 100 meter sprint athletes such as Ben Johnson thought steroids helped create an atmosphere in the game where everyone felt they needed to be improving on their times in each race to gain the approval of the media and the fans.

They turned to steroids when natural regimens were not making them enough gains. The media turned a blind eye for a while and then decided to expose the steroid problem in the game. By exposing the problem they basically made it impossible for Ben Johnson not to address the issue. Now there is random testing and ramifications for getting caught. Sports. They promote the Olympic Games and make them more popular without the media the Olympics would not have the popularity they enjoy today.