There is a lot to learn from the Kenyans

The 60 000-seater Kasarani Stadium in Nairobi is packed to the rafters with a capacity crowd that erupts for hours, as if someone has connected a tape recorder to a loudspeaker with a button that’s stuck on repeat.

Each time it seems the blast from their ecstatic voices is beginning to fade, another performance somewhere on the field lifts the spectators to their feet once again.

It’s an incredible experience which is emphasised by the fact that we’re not watching a professional football match or a World Cup rugby game. We’re witnessing the intense passion Kenyan people have for one of their favourite sports.

This is the World Under-18 Athletics Championships, though you would be forgiven for assuming otherwise if you fixed your eyes on the crowd.

Even more remarkable is that more than 40 000 people have been turned away at the gate.

Never before has a youth track and field meeting attracted this much excitement. Not here, nor anywhere else in the world.

Rewind three months to the SA Senior Championships at Puk-McArthur Stadium in Potchefstroom.

There is equal excitement emanating from the crowd but you wouldn’t think it – not because South African athletics supporters don’t share the passion of the Kenyan people, but simply because there are far fewer people in the stands.

A few thousand people turned out at the national championships, thanks largely to the #FillUpPotch social media campaign which was launched by elite athletes in the build-up.

It may have seemed that was as good as it was going to get because athletics is not football, rugby or cricket, and there’s a perception that it will always take a back seat.

Until the Kenyan track and field fans show us that the drive to push the sport forward in our country has not reached its ultimate potential. If the movement is allowed to gain further momentum, it has

Wesley Bo on

only just begun.

The first two things they got right in Nairobi were by no means a surprise because it’s the same approach that was taken in Potch. A social media campaign was launched and went viral because enough people gave an indication of their interest in the sport, and the majority of the mainstream media threw their weight behind the event.

Two things Kenya (and the IAAF) got right which South Africa got wrong is that the event was broadcast live, which helped create hype and drive locals to the stadium over the last two days, and the spectators did not have to dig into their pockets to watch the athletes in action. Entry was free.

Give someone with limited re- sources the option between a bag of mealie meal and a ticket to a sports event, and you’re going to end up on the losing end of that one.

Yes, the stadium in Potch is far smaller than that in Nairobi, but there’s no argument to be had there because 100 000 people were not turned away at the gate.

The fact that the national championships was not televised live by the SABC, which holds the rights, is nothing short of a disgrace, especially considering the quality of performances being produced week in and week out by South African athletes.

And charging people to watch athletics so you can scrape together some money is also a nogo. When you can attract 100 000 people to a stadium in the era of professional sport, then you have a product worth selling.

The national championships is not part of a series organised by an independent meeting promoter. It is the flagship event for Athletics South Africa, a non-profit organisation, and if money is needed to put the meeting together, then find it elsewhere.

Trying to make a profit from the fans is unacceptable, and all you’re doing in a country with a struggling economy and a ridiculously high unemployment rate is chasing potential spectators away.

The event in Kenya was a global championship, but as far as pure athletic performances are concerned, the SA Championships is equally enticing.

Kenya has proved athletics does not need to play second fiddle to other codes, and South African athletes have proved they can offer as much by way of entertainment and world-class performances as any other code.

Track and field is on the rise in SA, and we must surely have the ability to match what our fellow Africans have achieved in promoting the sport.

We can make excuses all day, but we now have a blueprint, and if there is not a far larger crowd at next year’s national championships, then someone is doing something horribly wrong.