Sonia O’Sullivan: Reflections from a day in the life of the Australian Open

The indoor athletics season is only a couple of weeks old and already some of the top names are weighing up the pros and cons of competing there at all. That’s always a greater dilemma in Olympic year, when unlike in many other sports it’s the only event that really seems to matter and carry the most weight.

For some athletes maybe it does. Rhasidat Adeleke has just had another record-breaking start to her season, improving her own Irish indoor 60m and 200m records in Albuquerque last weekend. Still, she’s undecided about the major indoor climax at the World Indoor Championships in Glasgow on the first weekend in March and the European Athletics Championships in Rome, another athletics major in early June.

The sense already is her season hinges solely on her performance at the Olympics in Paris later in the summer. Same with distance runners around the world, who are undecided about the World Cross Country Championships in Belgrade at the end of March. Once upon a time that was one of the major dates on the athletics calendar, even in Olympic year, but for some reason not anymore.

It’s also interesting when you compare athletics to other individual sports such as tennis and golf, where the top names will only miss a major event if they are forced out through injury

There’s also another list of fast races lined up for the Boston University indoor track this weekend, and for many athletes there the aim will be to qualify for the Olympics in Paris. Even if it’s unlikely they’ll be able to replicate those times come the height of the summer.

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It’s also interesting when you compare athletics to other individual sports such as tennis and golf, where the top names will only miss a major event if they are forced out through injury. The financial reward is too great in these majors to just decide not to turn up.

I got a reminder of that this week when attending the Australian Open at Melbourne Park, the first of the four Grand Slam tennis events held each year, preceding the French Open, Wimbledon, and the US Open. It was also my first time there in several years, and it has grown so much beyond the tennis courts.

The closest thing I’ve seen recently was the World Athletics Championships in Budapest last August, where they had all the different fan zones in and around the stadium. Things are a bit more enclosed at the tennis, but it is the biggest attraction in Melbourne in January.

Things are a lot different in professional tennis when it comes to the top names showing up. You get a reminder of that every time you look at the tournament App, reading up on the players, where one of the first things it tells you is their prize money for the last year, then their career prize money. Only the marathon majors in athletics come anywhere close, and that’s just prize money before you even consider sponsorship and endorsement money. A truly professional sport.

One of the games we saw was the fourth-round match between Daniil Medvedev against Nuno Borges, the first player from Portugal to reach the second week

It’s a completely different world to athletics, in that they will turn up regardless, knowing they’re going to get a worthwhile payment if seeded in the main draw. Whereas in athletics, even if you turn up you might not get paid. Unless you finish in the top three, it might not be worth going for some athletes.

One of the games we saw was the fourth-round match between Daniil Medvedev against Nuno Borges, the first player from Portugal to reach the second week. The other thing with tennis is that it sometimes takes so long to get a result, and you did get the sense a lot of people wanted Borges to win, but they also wanted the game to be over, and Medvedev was probably the only one who could end it quick. And he did.

It’s also that bit easier to identify with the athletes, especially track and field, when you see the result straight away. Tennis is like slow cooking, athletics is more like fast food. Some of the games go on until early in the morning, good for Europe while Australians head to bed.

The other thing noticeable was the presence of so many Russian players competing. There was one of the women’s games between a player from Ukraine and Belarus and they didn’t shake hands at the end of the game. That didn’t go unnoticed. But a lot of these Russian tennis players don’t even live or train in Russia, which may make things a little different to some of the Russian athletes.

Sitting in the Melbourne crowd I also got the sense that for some in attendance, it was in some way more about being at the event rather than watching the tennis. As in you get the sense there is something about these events that are just created to feel like it’s all about being there.

We ended up sitting next to a guy from Sydney, in the main sponsor-assigned seats. And it felt like he was all about who he could meet and catch a photograph with and already had his selfie with Novak Djokovic. It felt like he was looking around to see who else he could e meet as if it’s a bonus to see someone famous.

He was also talking about wanting to go to the US Masters to see the golf, even though it was going to cost him in the region of $20,000 (€18,500). He was trying to find who we were, giving me the 20 questions, why were we in these seats, waving over at his friends just behind the players’ box. I was giving very little away, then three girls in front is us turned around and recognised me.

The Olympics will always stand above all events on the athletes’ schedule, yet there is no direct financial reward

Then he wanted to know even more, and again you could tell he had very little interest in the tennis. When I mentioned to him I was down in Augusta last year, and got to walk the course with Shane Lowry’s father, he nearly jumped out of his seat and wanted to know how I possibly knew him.

Some of that goes on at the Olympics as well, but I think that people who watch athletics know and care a little more about what they’re watching, have a bit more of a connection to the sport and most are avid fans.

The Olympics will always stand above all events on the athletes’ schedule, yet there is no direct financial reward. Next is the World Championships, staged every two years, then a mish-mash of World Athletics events from which athletes pick and choose. As a result, you find many major races lack the depth you would expect to see at a World Championship event.

World Athletics has recently identified some mouth-watering potential clashes that we would all like to see and maybe it’s time to make more of them happen. No matter what the sport, it’s only as good as the best competing against each other regularly throughout the year.