The main motivation for this trip was to attend the World's Athletic (Track and Field) Championships which are held every other year in odd-numbered years. Previous World's have involved trips to Edmonton, Berlin and Daegu, with future trips to involve Beijing and London. A good way to combine travel with sport. This year's event was held at Luhzniki Stadium, just south of the Moscow city center. Luhzniki was site of the 1980 Olympic Games, so there was a bittersweet vibe entering the stadium which should have hosted the US team in 1980. Luhzniki seats approximately 80,000 for soccer, but with large press sections and tarped-off areas, the seating for the World's was probably less than 50,000. Tickets for the 9 day affair were a very reasonable $200 and when ticket sales didn't approach expectations, the daily prices were lowered to as little as $3 for a morning session and $10 for an evening session, thus assuring the Russians of a stadium that looked reasonably full. Putting fans into the seats was also a problem in Daegu, but the Koreans had to give away tickets and bus school and church groups to the stadium.
The stadium was convenient to two metro stops and the commute from the center of town to the stadium only took about 30 minutes with half of that walking from the subway to the entrance. Typical of these events, the first day was poorly organized with bad security communications (some folks were allowed to bring in cameras, others were refused, others were told they needed a special sticker, the sticker people refused to give stickers out for small cameras and numerous other small hassles that showed the lack of planning that's rarely evident at the Oly Trials, for instance). At the end of the session they mistakenly asked everyone to scan their tickets for re-admittance, even though the session was over. This created a huge back up of folks trying to leave the stadium and was only resolved when attendees started screaming at the security force. And speaking of security, there is no lack of police presence in Moscow; the stadium area looked as though they were expecting soccer hooligans with hundreds of well-positioned police and military all around the stadium. Perhaps they were right since once tickets were almost given away, the typical fans that showed up were rather boorish, screaming for their favorites when the starter's gun was up and cheering the failures of opponents. All in all, very distasteful to the real track fans. I started silently rooting for Russians and Ukranians to not qualify for finals.
One of the most glaring inadequacies of the meet was the lack of daily programs for the general public. While the press got a nicely bundled daily program, the rest of us had to resort to begging the press for copies, sneaking into the press areas to grab one or hoping to get lucky and snag one of the very few that found their way to the public information booth. While the data signals were generally good enough during the daytime sessions to pull up startlists on a mobile device, there simply wasn't enough bandwidth to do so in the evenings. A dozen of us were interviewed by a local AP stringer and complaints about lack of programs topped the list of what we didn't like about the meet.
For the most part, the ushers inside the stadium were very kind and with a smile, anyone could move from section to section to watch various events. Anyone who has seen a track meet in a huge stadium knows that it's almost impossible to watch every event without a lot of moving around.
My group of 13 independent travelers (meaning we were too cheap...make that thrifty... to pay the fees charged by the Track and Field News tour) included folks from the US, Sweden and Australia. I was kidded for wearing Duck gear almost every day and rooting for the Republic of Eugene and its associated runners. This sat well with the Aussies and Zoe Buckman, at least. Meanwhile, the Track and Field News tour group sat a few meters away, many with obstructed views as a result of TV platforms being built after the seats were sold.
As the meet progressed, the small crowds from the opening days became larger, possibly due to an influx of cheap seats being dumped at the last moment. Security remained tight and entering the subway after the meet involved going through a 100 meter long human funnel formed by police and police on horses. At least this prevented stampedes at the station entrances. We got smart and found an alternate station about the same distance from the stadium, but with 1/10 the traffic of the main station. One night the organizers decided that the crowd would be held in order to force people to stay for medal ceremonies. In our section, three security personnel linked arms at the tunnel and tried to prevent thousands from leaving. While we foreigners were yelling to "Let us out!", Russian fans started beating on the guards and several fistfights broke out, one involving a woman. Suzee and I managed to escape during these fights before more security was called. Others wound up trapped in the section for 30 minutes until they were allowed to leave.
I'll refrain from discussing individual events, since all that info is available elsewhere. Like Daegu, however, my best highlight was seeing Centro get a surprise medal. Another highlight was getting to talk with Ashton the day after his gold medal win; happy to report he's still the same really nice guy he always was.
Given the inability to put fans into the stadiums the past two years, Lanana's seemingly wild idea to bring the World's to Eugene seems less far-fetched. 30,000 fans at full price would surely generate more revenue than the giveaways of the past couple of Worlds. I realize that there are a lot of other issues involved (expanding Hayward Field, hotel rooms, government support), but it isn't such a crazy idea as some of us thought several years ago when it was first broached.
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| Day 1 AM Session--Where is Everyone? |
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| Ash Prepares to Long Jump |
One of the most glaring inadequacies of the meet was the lack of daily programs for the general public. While the press got a nicely bundled daily program, the rest of us had to resort to begging the press for copies, sneaking into the press areas to grab one or hoping to get lucky and snag one of the very few that found their way to the public information booth. While the data signals were generally good enough during the daytime sessions to pull up startlists on a mobile device, there simply wasn't enough bandwidth to do so in the evenings. A dozen of us were interviewed by a local AP stringer and complaints about lack of programs topped the list of what we didn't like about the meet.
For the most part, the ushers inside the stadium were very kind and with a smile, anyone could move from section to section to watch various events. Anyone who has seen a track meet in a huge stadium knows that it's almost impossible to watch every event without a lot of moving around.
My group of 13 independent travelers (meaning we were too cheap...make that thrifty... to pay the fees charged by the Track and Field News tour) included folks from the US, Sweden and Australia. I was kidded for wearing Duck gear almost every day and rooting for the Republic of Eugene and its associated runners. This sat well with the Aussies and Zoe Buckman, at least. Meanwhile, the Track and Field News tour group sat a few meters away, many with obstructed views as a result of TV platforms being built after the seats were sold.
As the meet progressed, the small crowds from the opening days became larger, possibly due to an influx of cheap seats being dumped at the last moment. Security remained tight and entering the subway after the meet involved going through a 100 meter long human funnel formed by police and police on horses. At least this prevented stampedes at the station entrances. We got smart and found an alternate station about the same distance from the stadium, but with 1/10 the traffic of the main station. One night the organizers decided that the crowd would be held in order to force people to stay for medal ceremonies. In our section, three security personnel linked arms at the tunnel and tried to prevent thousands from leaving. While we foreigners were yelling to "Let us out!", Russian fans started beating on the guards and several fistfights broke out, one involving a woman. Suzee and I managed to escape during these fights before more security was called. Others wound up trapped in the section for 30 minutes until they were allowed to leave.
I'll refrain from discussing individual events, since all that info is available elsewhere. Like Daegu, however, my best highlight was seeing Centro get a surprise medal. Another highlight was getting to talk with Ashton the day after his gold medal win; happy to report he's still the same really nice guy he always was.
Given the inability to put fans into the stadiums the past two years, Lanana's seemingly wild idea to bring the World's to Eugene seems less far-fetched. 30,000 fans at full price would surely generate more revenue than the giveaways of the past couple of Worlds. I realize that there are a lot of other issues involved (expanding Hayward Field, hotel rooms, government support), but it isn't such a crazy idea as some of us thought several years ago when it was first broached.
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