Diving for Dollars
Posted By Paul Kotik on 29 July 2002
Professional Freediving -- now there's a concept we can all get our heads around. Why not ? Youthful athletes with beautiful bodies in death-defying feats of superhuman stamina, exotic locations, foreign accents.. ... what's not to like ?
There's more - world records which astonish and then astonish again. ESPN, the Discovery Channel and Fashion TV all in one sleek, action-packed world tour -- with millions in prize money at stake. Fanatically devoted fans following their national teams and idolizing their favorite stars. Top competitors cannot walk the streets of Paris without bodyguards, for fear of being mobbed by rabid admirers. . .
Not. Well, mostly not. It's all true except the part about the fame and the money, which some see as a bit of a mystery given that it is all true -- except the part about the fame, and, of course, the money.
Will competitive freediving ever emerge as a commercially viable sport, even, say, at the modest levels of windsurfing, in-line skating or bowling?
There are only a handful of competitive freedivers in the world who can be said to be making a living from the sport, and all of these derive a significant proportion of their freediving income from instruction. Everybody knows sponsorship and media are somehow key elements, but nobody seems to have figured out how to run freediving in the black, so to speak.
What, exactly, would it take ?
First of all, it will take eyeballs. Lots and lots of eyeballs, whose owners want to aim them at freediving events and personalities. These eyeball-owners are the market which attracts the interest and money of sponsors and media outlets. Sponsors want to sell things into this market, and media outlets want to own the eyeballs to which the sponsors can make their pitches.
That's the way the world works.
Everybody knows it, but this is where the discussion bogs down when starving freedivers dream and plan, and pretty soon everybody goes back to stretching ( if we're on the way out) or rinsing ( on the way in) and another mile is tacked on to freediving's Poverty Road.
- Bookmark with :
- what are these?
