Dogfighting vs. Running: A Pyrrhic Victory

By Hal Higdon

A recent survey by the Sports Marketing Group in Atlanta identified dog-fighting as the sport most Americans hate with pro wrestling, bullfighting and pro boxing next on the hate list. Seemingly Americans dislike violent sports most, except also making the Group's Ten Most Hated list are golf and tennis.

But not marathoning.

Should we be encouraged by this Pyrrhic Victory, or discouraged? Americans do not hate running, but they also do not love it. On another survey by the National Sporting Goods Association targeting participation, running ranked only 15th, bracketed by power boating and hunting with firearms. Surf TV any weekend, and you'll find telecasts galore for those "hated" sports, but little for running. Did anybody watch Paul Tergat's recent world record marathon on TV? Maybe, if you lived in Deutschland.

It reminds me that the opposite of love is not hate, but rather indifference.

Still, more than 40,000 runners entered the LaSalle Bank Chicago Marathon in 2003; New York and London show similar numbers. While crowd estimates are notoriously unreliable, nobody can deny that spectators pack the sidewalks all along the course for all three marathons, and don't overlook the crowd appeal of Boston.

No complaints

Most interestingly, at least in Chicago, people no longer complain about marathons blocking traffic. David Kennedy, sports director of the Mayor's Office of Special Events, estimates that four years ago (1999), his office received twenty complaints; three years ago, a dozen, two years ago, two; last year, none. Marathoning sits atop any list of Free Big City Street Sports. Most Tour de France action occurs in the country.

In what other sport are its participants--fast and slow--so visible, filling the parks on weekends, the streets on weekdays, as we train for our next marathon? We are part of the mainstream: eye candy for those whose main athletic activity is clicking from golf to autoracing to tennis to football to baseball on TV, hating every moment of it.

And while the National Football League thumbs its nose at Major League Baseball, claiming twice the latter's popularity, I take solace in figures by American Sports Data that approximately 35 million Americans run one or more days a year and 10 million run more than one hundred days yearly. Poof, you most-hated and most-loved sports! I'm happy with running's position in the unloved, but also unhated, Middle Class.

What was the name of that guy with the fast time in Berlin?

MOST HATED SPORTS

1. Dogfighting
2. Pro Wrestling
3. Bullfighting
4. Pro Boxing
5. PGA Tour
6. PGA Seniors
7. LPGA Tour
8. NASCAR
9. Major League Soccer
10. ATP Men's Tennis

Source: The Associated Press

Hal Higdon is a Senior Writer for Runner's World. This article originally appeared as a Bell Lap column for that magazine's online edition.