TV Review / Larry Stewart : Marathon Coverage Runs Into Trouble

SportsChannel America, covering its first marathon Monday, hit the wall early and never recovered.

The coverage, carried in Los Angeles by Z Channel, illustrated: (a) Trying to televise a marathon is even tougher than running one, (b) SportsChannel didn’t prepare properly, (c) Channel 13’s work on the Los Angeles Marathon was tremendous by comparison, and (d) Bud Collins should stick to tennis.

Collins, host of the coverage, compared Ingrid Kristiansen to Bjorn Borg during the show. Of course. Two peas in a pod.

Collins said Kristiansen was as unemotional as Borg, who was known for his poise on a tennis court. But you had to wonder, how would Collins know? Tennis is his sport, not running.

Nothing wrong with having a non-running person around to curb all the running lingo, or poke fun at it. Collins pointed out that PR means personal record , which probably all viewers didn’t know. And he made up his own lingo--PB for personal barrier, which was OK.

But for the most part, Collins struggled with this assignment.

At least he was better than the woman who sat next to him, Barbara Bickford, the wife of 10,000-meter runner Bruce Bickford.

At one point Collins asked her if Kristiansen still had a shot at a world record. Bickford said no.

Collins: “So what about the Boston Marathon women’s record? What is that record?”

From Bickford came silence. Not, “Just a second and I’ll check.” Simply silence.

Collins didn’t let her off the hook, though. He asked again, and someone finally gave her the mark.

Collins asked about the record again as Kristiansen approached the finish line. Viewers could see the clock read 2:24 and change. The record is 2:24:30, set last year by Rosa Mota.

It was going to be close. So what did Bickford say? Something about the splits indicating she wouldn’t get the record. Forget the splits. Just look at the clock.

Kristiansen’s time: 2:24:33.

Earlier, Collins noted that barriers along the course gave Kristiansen two lanes to run in. “The crowd is not suffocating her,” he said.

Bickford’s observation: “The only thing that is suffocating her is the crowd noise.” Say what?

Craig Virgin was the other prominent commentator, while Bill Rodgers, Mr. Boston Marathon, was on hand but didn’t get much air time. And Larry Rawson, a competent running announcer, was reduced to holding a microphone that sometimes didn’t work.

For the first post-race interview, Collins said: “Now we go to Larry Rawson with the men’s winner.”

Rawson was then shown with Ibrahim Hussein, the fourth-place finisher who won last year. Oh well, close. Rawson conducted the interview, but the words came over so muddled they were barely discernable.

Later, Rawson did get to the winner, Abebe Mekonnen. This time, nothing. The audio problems had worsened.

“It’s not easy to televise a marathon,” Collins explained.

No kidding.

SportsChannel also had all kinds of technical problems with the pictures, which kept breaking up.

And the camera work was shabby. When winner Mekonnen finally started to pull away from Juma Ikangaa, the runner-up, at the 24-mile mark, the one dramatic moment in the race, the cameras left the two leaders.

It should be noted that Sports- Channel is not experienced in televising marathons, which, obviously, is a difficult task. So, as Channel 13 has done each year with the L.A. Marathon, perhaps SportsChannel will learn from some of its mistakes and come back stronger next year. At least, let’s hope so.