multisport event
Heading towards the Olympics in a festival mood? The finals as an opportunity
Florian Wellbrock is critical of the scheduling of the German championships as part of the finals. photo
© Andreas Gora/dpa
From this Thursday onwards, disciplines that are otherwise rarely in the limelight will be presented at the multi-sport event Finals. The anticipation is great. However, an Olympic champion sees the date critically.
The finals have established themselves in sport and in the TV program before their fourth edition – even if there are isolated critical voices. The mix of traditional Olympic disciplines and trend sports in combination with some unusual competition venues is intended to appeal to a wide audience.
“There is a festival atmosphere at the finals, top-class sport is presented in a colorful and diverse way,” said the President of the German Olympic Sports Confederation, Thomas Weikert, the German Press Agency. “Major sporting events in Germany are particularly popular when they are sustainable and inexpensive, take everyone along and involve social sectors. Then the wave of euphoria spills out of the stadiums and halls into the whole city or the whole country.”
The 61-year-old added: “That’s why we’re working – soon with all areas of society – on a concept for the Olympic and Paralympic Games that makes exactly this possible.”
Successful European Championships
What the aspired enthusiasm can look like could already be seen in Munich last year. The European Championships with European Championships in nine disciplines in August 2022 turned into a big sports and folk festival. The term “mini Olympics” made the rounds.
However, the truth also belongs: Since 1986, German initiatives for summer and winter games have failed in series, also because of the popular vote – for example when trying to hold the Winter Games for 2022 with Munich and the Summer Games for 2024 with Hamburg. There is probably still a lot to be done to really get broad approval. It is also still unclear whether the focus will ultimately be on North Rhine-Westphalia or another region. “We would be ready,” said Duisburg Mayor Sören Link (SPD) at least once.
His city and Düsseldorf are the focus of the fourth edition of the Finals. Starting this Thursday, 159 championship titles will be awarded over four days. Track and field athletes will also compete in Kassel for Olympic champion Malaika Mihambo. The swimming competitions take place in Berlin.
Extraordinary locations
In addition to traditional sports facilities, the organizers also rely on unusual locations such as the banks of the Rhine in Düsseldorf’s old town, where the pole vault decisions are made, or Duisburg’s inner harbor (stand-up paddling, canoeing, canoe polo). Spectators do not need tickets for numerous competitions. This can also appeal to visitors who otherwise have little interest in competitive sports. In addition, television plays a major role in the visibility of the event.
ARD and ZDF want to show more than 25 hours live in the main programs. Around 70 hours can be seen in streams. How such TV days can work with a wide variety of sports is regularly shown in the cold season. “Winter sports have benefited from extremely well-done TV weekends for years, the finals continue this for the summer and make athletes and fans happy,” said DOSB President Weikert. The TV presence should also be advertising for smaller sports that are not otherwise in the limelight.
The multi-sport event is correspondingly popular with associations of such disciplines. “There has been a complete rethink. In the meantime, more associations want to participate than there are actually opportunities,” said ARD sports coordinator Axel Balkausky. “We no longer think about how we address associations, but about the fact that we have to find regulations on how all associations can get their rights.”
scheduling conflicts
However, with so many types of sport with their individual highlights in the annual calendar, conflicts of dates are inevitable. Olympic champion Florian Wellbrock would have preferred a different period for the finals. “To be honest, I have to shake my head a bit. Swimming isn’t sold well in Germany,” Wellbrock told dpa. The Tokyo Olympic champion in open water and currently the best German swimmer will not take part in the national title fights due to the World Championships in Japan starting on July 14th. Of course, the other World Cup starters also geared their training towards the World Cup.
By the way, next year there will be no finals because of the Olympic Games in Paris. The fifth edition of the event is then planned for Dresden in summer 2025.