Tytuł prowokacyjny, ale niestety prawdziwy, co za chwilę udowodnię.

My inspiration for this post was an interview I've seen recently with Polish tennis player Jerzy Janowicz after his last game (you can see it here). You could say that maybe he was showing too much grieving because of the defeat, but there is one great outcome from this interview, as he finally called a spade a spade. He said it all: about poor training conditions, which are far from the Western standards, that level of knowledge and language used in materials published in the biggest Polish sport portals, newspapers and TV reached the bottom already some time ago, and nobody is trying to lift them up, and more... But what does this have to do with blading? And why is media such a liar?
To answer this, first you have to imagine rainy, autumn day and two TVN (Polish TV channel) reporters approach you and ask for help, saying that they have been around the city for a few hours now and they want to film some material about skaters, and that they have to do it by next day, but some how they can't find any people skating. I wonder why ...
Let me start from the beginning (well, middle couse you know the background already). Working with the hero of today's images (and my hero from the back days ...) - Marek Doniec is a bit different than the way I usually work with skaters. Marek is a pro! I mean if I arrange a photo session with him, then this is all he focuses on. He prepares in advance, finds the right spots, shows them to me so that I could also be ready, he knows what tricks he could do there, he is physically and mentally prepared and - what is sometimes crucial - very determined to do great job. The day when these images were created didn't seem to be suitable for skating at first. Since the early morning the streets were wet and when I drove from Oświecim to Katowice it started to rain a bit. But for Marek and me, that day was the last one when we could try to take pictures right next to the new railway station in Katowice. Weather forecast for the upcoming days promised heavy rain, and to make it even worse the road where Marek planned to land was going to be open at any day now. So that day was literally the only one when we could do some work.
Imagine how surprise I was, when it turned out that these two TV reporters that I've mentioned before said that they "must" prepare a brief material about skaters for the next day's news. Nothing seemed to be getting into their heads, I tried to explain that the weather was bad, that it would be better to go to a skate park and show people some little simpler and more approachable tricks, rather than high level that Marek represents. Unfortunately they didn't care about any of that, and they just recorded whatever they thought was appropriate, and assembled the sad, rainy material that you can see on TVN24 website (live it looked much more colorful and positive, check pictures for the proof). Now think that this minor documentary was seen by a mother of a young child who wonders what sport could her child do....I bet she is like: "let's get some skates for my son! can't wait for him to fall down and break his leg!" And this is only because that TV spot shows it that way. No matter how good Marek is, or how much fun skating could be, this material just doesn't reflect it. I find it very disappointing. Dear TV people, please put some professional manner, and a lot of heart into your job. The outcome will amaze you :) Now, let's look at Marek, isn't skating the best? Yo!