You only need to spend 5 minutes outside to see it. People running for the bus or to catch the train. Forcing themselves to hit the road for some exercise, training for that next half marathon or out pounding the streets for fun. They’ll run anywhere it seems. Except to their TV screens to watch the next instalment of the Diamond League, or to their phones to catch up on track news. For a sport centred around running, athletics has a pretty shameful track record when it comes to getting people on their feet to watch the latest competition in town. But when it comes to football, you bet it’s a rush to the stadium doors.
Two sides to popularity
So why is this then? Football is the most popular sport in the world and tennis lies not far behind. But when you head to work in the morning, chances are you’re not seeing them half as much, if at all, as running. Far more people run in their spare time than play either of these two sports. Yet somehow all these potential fans get lost when the action moves to the track. It’s as if there were this huge chasm between casual runners and an interest in the professional scene.
Maybe that’s just it though: is running seen as mundane? Everyone can do it. It’s the most common form of cardio, you see it everywhere on the streets around you, so why would you pay to watch it? It’s unlikely by this point that you haven’t heard someone utter the phrase ‘but all they do is run in circles’ on the topic of athletics events. They would be wrong of course, but the premise is understandable. After all, on a surface level, each discipline does involve, at some speed and to some extent, running round a circular track. How is someone meant to appreciate the intricacies and excitement of each of those if they have no context? Or no personal experience to draw from?
How accessible is athletics to the average viewer?
This brings me to my first point on why athletics may not be as popular as my two sports of reference: accessibility. Track is not seen often enough as a sport that can be undertaken purely for the fun of it, no matter the level of expertise or lack thereof. People play tennis for fun (I certainly did and am by no means good at it). Football is everywhere and probably the most common sports club at university, school, wherever. When it comes to track though, unless you were at one point involved competitively in the sport, the chances of seeing someone with no prior attachment run for fun at your local track are very slim.
To some extent I understand it: track is highly technical. To put on spikes for the first time as a complete novice can potentially be damaging. On the other hand, you see people do sprints on the treadmill at the gym all the time, so why not on a track? Opening up the market for casual track clubs, with fitness and fun in mind and only light competition, would be an important step in bridging this gap.
After all, athletics as a sport is unique in the sense that you don’t need to compete seriously to have that motivation and urge to improve. You not only feel it, but the times speak for themselves and it all comes from within. Building not just a fan base, but the right kind of fan base, has to happen from the ground up. You need people who are genuinely invested in the sport and not just the spectacle of it.
A numbers problem
Here, however, is where we run into another obstacle in the path of athletics’ popularity. Unless you’re in the world of competitive running yourself, which as we’ve established not so many people are, it is difficult to appreciate. The thrill of watching just isn’t there if you’re looking at the clock after a men’s 100m race, seeing the numbers 9.78 and not knowing whether that is in fact very fast or just about average, because you simply have no reference point. Some will remember a year ago when it became a trending topic that Mbappé was the fastest footballer alive. For that he was receiving more attention for his speed than professional sprinters themselves. However it only took a simulation of him being beaten very comfortably by the world record holder Usain Bolt for people to realise that for a man to run 10.6 is not in fact that impressive.
When it comes to sports like football and tennis on the other hand, the talent and skill of players is easily recognisable. Even to people with no prior knowledge of the sport. It’s because that kind of talent isn’t measured by metrics, but instead in a largely qualitative way. In running the numbers are key. While they do lead to fascinating comparisons and elevate competition, without context they have no meaning. That context, unfortunately, doesn’t reach much further than the stadiums themselves.
Why are so few track athletes global stars?
Unfortunately, it’s not just the context surrounding athletics that has a limited reach: it’s the athletes themselves. Big names. Rivalries. These are two things that football and tennis have plenty of. And they’re also a big reason for their long and continued success as mainstream sports. In football the debate about who is the greatest is still burning steadily. The Messi/Ronaldo comparisons have kept people hooked for years. In fact, 5 of the top 50 most followed accounts on Instagram in the world are footballers.
But it’s not just that. You have teams to root for, and classic matchups like Barça vs Real Madrid. These all create more buzz and long-term investment in the sport. Tennis too has its own fair share of big names and rivalries. Take the current Sinner vs Alcaraz for example, and still today the likes of Djokovic. That leaves fans with a whole host of specific competitors to root for across the season, whether that be based on country, game style, whatever they choose.
Success in athletics doesn’t equal fame
To turn the conversation back to athletics, the sport itself is not averse to these phenomenons, because of course almost the entire population is familiar with the name Usain Bolt, but it took breaking two major world records, winning several golds, and cementing himself as practically unbeatable, in order to do so. It has to be noted as well that his events were the 100m and 200m, two of the most easily digestable, instant-thrill events to watch for a less well-versed audience, which undoubtedly had an impact on his notoriety.
After all, hasn’t Sydney Mclaughlin-Levrone done the same? World record after world record in the 400mH. Gold medal after gold medal. American record and World Championship gold in the 400m. A whole host of incredible feats, yet she hasn’t been solidified as a big name outside the sport itself. If I had to posit a theory I would say most likely because the 400mH isn’t as sensationalised an event as the 100m. It’s also not particularly well understood or appreciated by people who aren’t track lovers themselves. Which is why, yet again, encouraging involvement in the sport, whether that be casual or competitive, is so crucial to building a bigger audience for athletics.
The power of rivalries
Now let’s talk rivalries. Recently big names have started to emerge. One athlete in particular, Noah Lyles, has gained a certain level of fame and managed to reach a fan base beyond the world of athletics. But who is his rival? Or rivals? Audiences love the thrill of seeing the big names line up against the same challenger across the season. But that challenger is hard to pinpoint when 38 men have run under 10 seconds in the 100m in 2025.
The same goes for Femke Bol and Sydney Mclaughlin-Levrone, who are often talked about as rivals in the context of the 400mH. But how much of a rivalry can there be when they only race each other at major championships once or twice a year? The fans don’t have consistent head-to-heads to look forward to throughout the season or one specific favourite to root for. That is where interest is lost, and what restricts the pool of potential audiences to those with a longstanding knowledge and passion for the sport.
The future of athletics as a global sport
So how do we change this? One way is by improving financial incentives to encourage athletes to participate more regularly on the circuit. New events like Athlos are making strides but the existing Diamond League has all the right foundation and timetabling to become the centre stage for such head-to-heads if adjustments are made. It’s not only up to the governing bodies though: the athletes are also crucial in nurturing rivalries. If the times themselves aren’t capable of picking out a challenger, let them be the ones to choose.
There should be more of a culture of challenging others to appear at races throughout the season. Creating a buzz, getting the audience hooked on a storyline. Noah Lyles has been planting the seeds for this with his comments towards the likes of fellow sprinters Oblique Seville and Kenny Bednarek. As the years go by we can only hope that this will grow and spread to other disciplines. The 100m might be the event with the closest margins, but it is not the only one with competition worthy of excitement.
In the spirit of an athletics event, let me bring us back full circle. How an action so common can lead to a sport so misunderstood is not an easy question to answer. But, if anything, I’d like to leave you with this. Athletics doesn’t do all the running so you don’t have to: it does it to make you want to. That’s the difference.
Written by- Rosana Ercilla
