Welcome to Locally Sourced, a biweekly Covering Climate Now newsletter for journalists working to localize the climate story. In each edition, we’ll suggest story ideas, offer reporting tips, and share example coverage to serve as inspiration. Vea la versión en español de “Fuentes Locales.”
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Story Spark: Covering Local Sports & Extreme Heat
With the Summer Olympic Games underway, now’s a good opportunity to warn audiences of the dangers posed by exercising and playing and watching sports in extreme heat conditions. How does extreme heat, exacerbated by climate change, affect local athletes — young and old — and sports — school, adult recreational, and professional — in your reporting area? How are sports organizations responding to protect athletes?
Why It Matters
Training and competing in outdoor summer sports can endanger athletes. On hot, humid days it’s harder for the human body to cool down, which can lead to dehydration, heat stroke, and even death. Some medical conditions and differing physical abilities can make people even more vulnerable to heat stress. Athletes of all ages and levels, coaches, fans, and sports organizations will need to factor in worsening extreme heat when training, competing, and spectating.
As the world increasingly faces record-breaking extreme heat, experts warn that new policies, such as including “cooling breaks” into events, are needed to keep professional, amateur, and youth athletes safe. That’s where great local journalism can help. Audiences need to know what precautions to take when exercising and watching sports outdoors during hot summer days and what sports organizations are doing – or not doing – to make sporting events safer.
Story Examples
- Jeffrey Brown explores how climate change is changing sports and how athletes and sports organizations are responding, for PBS NewsHour.
- Li Cohen at CBS News reports that climate change is reshaping how people exercise outdoors.
- Ahead of the Paris Olympics, CBS17 in Raleigh, N.C., talks to a midfielder for North Carolina FC who grew up playing soccer in Paris, France, about the challenges posed by extreme heat.
- In Ellenwood, Ga., Molly Samuel explains measures implemented to reduce heat-related illnesses during high school football practice, for NPR.
- In Karachi, Pakistan, women athletes in Sindh province face extreme heat challenges amidst limited resources and cultural barriers, Zofeen T. Ebrahim reports for Context.
- The local football club in Reading, England, selected a new uniform featuring the University of Reading’s climate stripes, Sam Pither reports for The Business Magazine.
Reporting Tips
Ed King, international climate strategy expert at the Global Strategic Communications Council, Climate Home News founder, and former BBC sports reporter, editor, and producer who covered the 2004 and 2008 Olympics, offers tips for reporting on extreme heat and sports:
Speak to local athletes. Extreme heat at the US Open tennis tournament, collapsing officials at the Copa America, and, as we’ll see at the Paris Olympics, endurance sports that start early or late to avoid intense heat are some examples of how sports are being impacted. Reach out to local sports clubs and teams to find athletes and learn how heat factors into their practice and competitions. Athletes of the World can also connect you with runners, rowers, cricketers, tennis stars, and more for interviews.
Go beyond elite sporting events. Grassroots sport is far more vulnerable to climate change than elite events. Ultimately children’s sports and amateur clubs will suffer with a shrinking player base as athletes opt to stay on the sidelines. Talk to the heads of major sports teams based in your area and local leagues to find out how they’re responding to climate impacts.
Don’t downplay the dangers of a few degrees. Scottish rugby star Jamie Farndale, who put himself in a heat chamber to simulate intense and humid temperatures, explains why temperature rise is so hard for athletes: “It is not in an athlete’s DNA to stop and if the conditions are too dangerous I do think there is a risk of fatalities.”
Resources
Safety
- Heat.gov outlines extreme heat dangers to athletes, and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lists state heat resources for athletes.
- Texas A&M University’s College of Education & Human Development examines “climate considerations for youth sport during the hottest years on record.”
- Climate Central’s resource, “Extreme Heat Risks for Children,” includes information on how to keep young athletes safe.
Voices
- Ecoathletes, an organization that mobilizes athletes, academics, climate scientists, and entrepreneurs focused on sports to take action on climate change, can put journalists in touch with athletes.
- Reach out to The Korey Stringer Institute at the University of Connecticut to discuss the impact of extreme heat on athletes.
- Team USA, which oversees US Olympic and Paralympic sports, has a state-by-state breakdown of US athletes who have qualified for the Paris Olympics.
- A list of US sports governing bodies is available on Wikipedia and the Amateur Athletic Union lists US district sports directors with their contact information.
Key Facts and Visuals
Both reports include camera-ready downloadable visuals for use in reporting.
- Climate Central’s report, “Paris: 100 Years of Olympic Warming,” looks at the risks that extreme heat poses to athletes, spectators, and outdoor workers, as the Olympic host city consistently experiences more intense and more frequent heat waves.
- Another Climate Central report, “More Extremely Hot Days for School Sports,” highlights heightened risks from extreme heat for student athletes who engage in outdoor sports.
Before We Go…
Covering Climate Now’s program, The Climate Station, trains local US TV newsrooms, including reporters, producers, and meteorologists, to more effectively cover climate stories – for free. For inquiries, email Elena González at elena[at]coveringclimatenow[dot]org.
And please send us your local climate stories! We’d love to consider them for Locally Sourced and our media trainings and social platforms. Email local[at]coveringclimatenow[dot]org.