Why or why not? Seems like there is enough countries to participate, if filmed right and on the right course makes an excellent spectator sport, etc.......
What are some reasons that this could not happen? Discuss........
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Re: Downhill Skateboarding in the Olympics? Why not?
hell, they got downhill skateboarding and street luge on tv...i think on the gravity games (not sure on that though). but yeah, get an international standard on scoring, timing, all that; a sheet of technical specs for the types of boards that are allowed...it's definitely possible, and it would definitely bring dh/longboarding into the mainstream which would help the sport out A LOT...oddly enough, i have been thinking about this topic for a few weeks now
Re: Downhill Skateboarding in the Olympics? Why not?
The Olympics today have become such a corporate, politicized and scandal-ridden fiasco that I really couldn't care less if there's skateboarding.
Lots of slalomers are always talking about how getting the Olympics to recognize the sport would be such an accomplishment.
HAH.
All it takes is for Coca-Cola or some multi-billion dollar bank to announce they support slalom and the Olympics would slobber like an old hound dog to please its corporate masters.
At one time (like 80 years ago) I do believe there was an olympic ideal. The games took at hit when Adolph Hitler decided to make it a propoganda event. the games, though, came back strong in the '50s and really were all about amateur athletic excellence.
Starting with Mexico City, though, the games started going downhill and the plunge is still strong. The Cold War, selling out (re: Peter Ueberroth), corporate interference (the 100th Anniversary games In Coca-cola's home town instead of Athens where they belonged) and now professionalism have made the Olympics just another opportunity to sell tires and shaving cream.
Here's a way to think about skateboarding in the Olympics.
You decide to compete. You go through the preliminaries and the trials and get a spot on the team.
BUT,
The wheels, trucks, bearings and deck that got you to the show aren't "officially recognized" by some sanctioning commitee. So in order to skate at the Olympics you ride somebody else's board, somebody else's wheels and somebody else's truck.
And this is supposed to be for the glory of your native land?
Baloney.
Give me a fun weekend of grassroots racing over some corporate bean counter telling me how to skate so more soda and beer get sold to some couch potato slob.
Re: Downhill Skateboarding in the Olympics? Why not?
It will never happen.
The current format of both slalom and downhill are not very spectator friendly, Dh and luge lost thier spots at both the Gravity and X-games. the TV viewers are bored with the traditional racing format. Use the last Olympics as an example, snowboard racing (gates) televised 5 runs total and the Boardercross they showed mens and womans Quarter, semi's and final heats. People want to see carnage. If skateboarding were to change its format of racing the Olympica and arenas are not out of the question.
In my opinion the future of televised skateboarding is in races like the Burning Wheels Tour in Europe. From what little I have seen this is basically a boardercross track (with whoops, airs, banks and the like). This offers the carnage, the excitement and the ease of the crowd to follow what is going on (the winner is the first person across the line not who finished first minus who knocked down the most cones). This type of racing then lends itself to taking the track on the road and setting up in any city and any arena. This could even lead to actual professional skateboard racers (sorta like what the BLR guys are trying to do).
Re: Downhill Skateboarding in the Olympics? Why not?
What happened to snowboarding once the Olympics got their hands on it? All they took was GS (I think...), boardercross, and halfpipe...all of which are styles that the majority of snowboarders don't do seriously/exclusively.
Shaun White won, as he did all the other events he entered that year. The downside of the event was how they blamed that poor girl for falling on the last kicker of the boardercross. Grabs stabilize you in the air, they don't throw you off balance.
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Location: buying used stuff off of SF, so i can look "gnar" with my pre-thrashed gear
Age: 21
Posts: 4,384
Re: Downhill Skateboarding in the Olympics? Why not?
yeah well, modern society basically requires all sports to be corporate sellouts...you can't watch a sporting event on tv without seeing tons of the "official ___ of *insert sport here*"
hell, you can't go to a live sporting event without seeing corporate logos splashed everywhere.
but, dh racing hasn't got the mainstream exposure like snowboarding did before snowboarding joined the olympics. if dh racing did join the olympics, it would be a great publicity booster for dh because the world hasn't already been exposed to tons of x-games coverage, piles of videogames, and dh-branded clothing
Re: Downhill Skateboarding in the Olympics? Why not?
maybe im just stupid, but when i was watching my copy of Evolutions 2, the timeship part came on. and one of the scenes was a DH race and it had the 5 rings from the olympics all over the place.
basically, wasn't DH in the olympics at some point?
Downhill Skateboarding in the Olympics? Why not?
thats hilarious.
