The Biathlon Union left the Europeans without their favorite sport. And Russia is to blame again!
The organizers of the World Cup cynically save on TV broadcasts. Soon the fan will have nothing to watch?
In the last couple of years, fans and athletes have been constantly comparing biathlon and ski federations – and always in the first place. During the coronavirus pandemic, the International Biathlon Union (IBU) has really done a lot to keep fans interested. However, one detail still raises many questions. The average European today cannot watch most of the races due to the fact that they take place in constant time.
A few years ago, the IBU set a goal to move starts to evening prime time in order to increase the audience of broadcasts. And Russia became one of the possible countries that heeded this recommendation. In Europe, the money spent on artificial light is still not being spent – especially now that energy costs in industry have increased manifold.
low prices should forget the fans about the evening races due to the savings of the organizers. Will Russia be to blame again?
Failure in Holmenkollen and breakthrough of Tyumen
In the early 2010s of the last century, the IBU announced an extremely low speed for evening races. the average program includes one series of four days, then half of the races are due to the high attention to oneself. Few people can afford to watch biathlon on Thursday and Friday for a long time.
Therefore, broadcast rights holders and IBU managers asked the stadiums to either rent lights for the duration of the events or invest in refurbishing the arenas. By the way, Östersund began to use the first stadium that held the race with artificial lighting, but did not use this practice in large quantities in other countries.
It was because of the non-compliance with the wishes of the international federation at the 2016 World Championships in optimal Holmenkollen that a real failure occurred. Although the races were scheduled during the daytime, the incredible fog that descended on the stadium simply paralyzed all possible ways for the starts.
Some races had to be moved to an earlier time in order to be in time before the fog. The organizers paid for this with half-empty stands and a monstrous TV picture. All because of the desire to save, because there was no artificial light in the arena.
An opposite example is the “Pearl of Siberia” in Tyumen. During the preparations for the European Championship 2016 and for the subsequent stages of the World Cup, our organizers immediately illuminated the track in accordance with all requirements. The average value of good light should be in the range of 1000-2000 lux – in our case this figure was close to the maximum.
The European championship was held for a couple of weeks of international championships.
Only Finland and Czech Republic
As you know, the Tyumen stage of the World Cup last season was arrested, and in the winter it will also not be. However, the organizers of the events converge on their own spectacles.
It’s worth signing up for the 2022/23 Custom World Cup. Only two arenas that are included in the course of the tournament have races in the evening: at the 8th event in Nove Mesto (Czech Republic) and at the 9th in Östersund, Sweden.
Formally, the first stage in Finnish Kontiolahti will also take place with the natural development of Italy, but this has nothing to do with interest. It’s just that in November daylight hours in this case are shorter than six hours, so the starts at 15:15 and 15:45 will be after sunset, but at the same time.
Starts of all other races on other sites are within the interval between 14:00 and 17:00. Of course, there are single races at noon and closer to 18:00, but this does not occur in the picture. Completion of many distances already takes place under artificial light, but these costs are incomparable to holding all competitions with full power of devices.
Do not go to this background and the World Cup in Oberhof. 1:45 pm, 3:25 pm, 4:30 pm, 4:45 pm, 5:10 pm – At this time, racing will begin in Germany in winter. Sunset on Sunday will be at 17:22, and dusk will come in about an hour, that is, by 18:00. Moreover, most programs will also occur naturally and at inconvenient times.
Due to the recent aggravation of diseases in Europe, the electric power industry has become an increased disease for Europeans. And if at the beginning and at the beginning of the year they saved on spectacles, now this trend will slightly increase. It is clear that such problems did not arise in Russia – but the IBU is now emphasizing its revealingness, than to please the events.