Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals/WikiProject Athletics


 * The following discussion is an archived proposal of the WikiProject below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the project's talk page (if created) or the WikiProject Council).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The resulting WikiProject was created at WikiProject Athletics

Description
A WikiProject covering what is currently described at the poorly named track and field athletics. This is athletics, which includes all track and field events, cross-country running and marathons. See working proposal in userspace.

The first aim of the project is to reorganise the primary topic into athletics with its child articles track and field, cross country running, Marathon etc. As currently discussed at the talk page: USA Track and Field (essentially the reason why the article is currently title so) is the only major athletics organisation in the world which oversees non-track and field events under the title of a "Track and Field" organisation, all other national, continental and international organisations refer to the mix of sports as "athletics".

Some overlap with WP:RUN but that project has failed to reach its scope. Despite its scope definition it has largely failed to expand beyond long distance running. WikiProject Athletics seeks to incorporate athletics bodies and events into the proposals, most of whose articles remain barely developed (e.g. International Association of Athletics Federations, Sprint (race)).

Support

 * 1) Support as nominator and primary WikiProject creator. Sillyfolkboy (talk) (edits) WIKIPROJECT ATHLETICS NEEDS YOU!  17:43, 16 May 2009 (UTC)
 * 2) (not joining but) Support -- good idea, and several have already joined it looks like. Try to absorb WP:RUN if you can (has better scope than WP:RUN by the way). Since those who joined already count as "supports," I think you can go ahead and move it to Wikipedia space. ~EdGl   &#9733;  02:49, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Oppose

 * 1) I think that WP:RUN includes track and field as well as road racing, racewalking and trail running. There has not been an overwhelming number of volunteers for WP:RUN and creating a separate WikiProject will not help things.  The IAAF and USATF are devoted to both all disciplines including racewalking, trail running and ultramarathoning as well.  I think that the general public would describe these as forms of "running."  In the United States, the word "athlete" now includes football and hockey players rather than the usage of 100 years ago which viewed athletics as being track and field.  I don't think that the word "athletics" as defined by the Olympic movement would include trail running or ultramarathoning. Racepacket (talk) 12:48, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Then where does that leave field events, like discus for example? There is a proposal here to integrate WP:RUN as a work group within WP:Athletics. This would not only combine the projects, but also allow for more direct focus on RUN's scope (leaving field events/combined events etc within the parent WikiProject's scope) and resolve the problem of the run project's lack of a rating scheme. What do you think of the work-group proposition? Sillyfolkboy (talk) (edits) WIKIPROJECT ATHLETICS NEEDS YOU!  14:53, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Also, on a side note, this proposal could actually help improve athletics coverage on en.wiki. To say that the French Wikipedia is absolutely dicking all over the English one in this respect is perhaps even an understatement. Sillyfolkboy (talk) (edits) WIKIPROJECT ATHLETICS NEEDS YOU! 


 * ''The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the project's talk page (if created) or at the WikiProject Council). No further edits should be made to this page.