Prime time for athletics heroes to

arrival of the Commonwealth Games in April gives Australia a chance to focus its awareness on some sports that may find it difficult to command attention at any other time.

A prime example is athletics.

Football in winter, cricket in summer and tennis in January, for valid reasons, dominate television and newspaper sports reporting.

Come Olympic and Commonwealth Games, Australian track and field athletes can have their moment in the sun. Just as

Ian Cole

kids can idolise AFL players, Big Bash cricketers and the skills of those in Rod Laver arena, the Commonwealth Games gives kids a chance to leave their Xboxes and marvel at the performances of track and field athletes. Even though when young, I could only listen to their exploits on the radio and see their black and white pictures in the newspaper, I held in the highest esteem Betty Cuthbert, Shirley Strickland, John Landy and Herb Elliott. For those in later years it may have been Cathy Freeman and Jai Taurima.

However, the holding of esteem is not just by the young ones.

As adults we can be transfixed by the feats of the great sportspeople and all ages can be inspired by their performances. Even in literature. In Ernest Hemingway’s Pulitzer Prizewinning The Old Man and the Sea, the old man, Santiago, is inspired to continue his battle with the great marlin through the example of the baseball star Joe DiMaggio whom he believed in his situation would never give up trying despite injury or misfortune.

But back to athletics. Besides inspiring the public, athletics can be exciting. History has presented us in Olympic or Commonwealth Games with some great rivalries.

These include Sebastian Coe and Steve Ovett in 1980, Mary Decker and Zola Budd in 1984 and John Landy and Roger Bannister in 1954.

The latter encounter is now enshrined in a bronze statue in Vancouver where the two met, capturing one of the Commonwealth Games’ most memorable moments.

Landy turns left to see where Bannister was and to all Australians’ disappointment, Bannister was on the right passing Landy.

Television and newspapers can play a huge role in promoting the events. Just as footballers, cricketers and tennis players become part of people’s lounge rooms through television, a few years ago the televising of swimming championships during prime time, helped make Ian Thorpe, Susie O’Neill and Grant Hackett household names.

Conversely, some claim that television has had a reverse effect on West Indian cricket. Whereas in the past, West Indian boys wanted to grow up and be like Wes Hall or Curtly Ambrose, now, because of cable television, American basketball is now the focus, and more kids want

to be basketballers than fast bowlers.

The great plusses about athletics are that it consists of numerous running, jumping and throwing events which can all be lifelong activities. Beginning with little athletics, then on to open competition and later to Masters Athletics it can all be a recipe for enduring fitness and participation.

Many hundreds of athletes recently competed in the Oceania Masters Athletics Championships in Dunedin, New Zealand, where men and women were aged from their 30s to their 90s. To see 80 and 90-year-olds running sprints and high jumping is inspirational stuff.

Talking to them, they continually downplayed their performances, saying they had fortunate DNA.

OK, they may have inherited fortunate DNA but they had used it to maintain a fitness level that enabled them to still participate in various events at their age.

Athletics has attracted over the years numerous personalities including Jai Taurima, the long jump silver medallist in the 2000 Olympics. A noted night owl, he claimed he may have won gold if the final had been held between 2am and 4am!

Meanwhile, Ronnie Corbett of the Two Ronnies once claimed he gave up athletics after he was lapped in the long jump.

And a French track and field coach some years ago was asked why France could not produce great track and field athletes like they can produce great wine.

He replied, “The winemakers got in first.”

On a more serious note, it is hoped the Commonwealth Games will not only give inspiration to those watching but some aspiration to a whole new generation.

And maybe by chance all athletic events can be compelling viewing and prove Al Oerter, four-time Olympic discus gold medallist wrong, when he said, “Discus throwing will never become a spectator sport, unless they change the rules and allow the competitors to throw the discuses at each other.”

Ian Cole is a former Hobart teacher who was a state Labor MP in the 1970s.