Does The Competitive Format Control Our Destiny

Formats and Freedom

The Street League format is incredibly effective, Rob Dyrdek knew what he was doing. Clear scoring, a static course, and a format that audiences can understand make it perfect for broadcast and sponsorship. You don’t need to know skateboarding intimately to follow the leaderboard. Technical street skating is filled with complexity, and conjecture. A hard flip v’s front flip. Is it a 360 Flip or a Tre Flip… SLS makes this less of a quandary for the punter. Every trick, every fall, every landing matters in a way that is immediately obvious.

But here’s the contradiction: while the format works beautifully for spectators and media, skateboarding, like surfing and snowboarding, originated as an expressive art form. Personal style, improvisation, and interpretation are central to the culture. Judging those qualities objectively is almost impossible.

I grew up skating crusty bowls and backyard wooden ramps, not streets. I’m a heavy-footed ground dwelling bird, definitely not an agile cat that glides down hand rails. Thus my approach has always been about flow and my own interpretation on a transition, with the crew super close by cheering on from the coping or bench. Formats like Belco Bowl Jam in Canberra, align far more with that ethos, and generally for guys my age this is a consistent trend. A gnar bowl contest is filled with spontaneity, balls, guts and creativity. Street competitions are structured, on the clock, provide controlled repetition, precision and consistency with technical perfection.

Commercial Forces at Play

This is where the commercial reality enters. Formats don’t exist in a vacuum. They are driven by media, sponsors, and audience metrics. Broadcasters need predictable events to sell airtime. Sponsors want maximum exposure for their investment. And the competitions themselves cost millions to run.

It’s no surprise, then, that formats are increasingly structured around audience clarity and dollar returns, rather than the culture or the athletes themselves. The event is designed to be consumable, not necessarily to celebrate the most expressive, artistic or unique rider flair.

In effect, athletes and culture become subservient to commercial interests. The very people who live and breathe these sports, who dedicate their lives to them, often have little say in the formats that define success.

Comparing Across Sports

Surfing presents another case entirely. The ocean is unpredictable, making structured competitions inherently difficult. Until recently, the World Surf League relied on events scattered across remote locations, with conditions often beyond anyone’s control. Wave pool technology, specifically Kelly’s Lemore Pool and the Dubai pool has attempted to mimic the predictability of formats like Street League, creating controlled, repeatable competitions.

But in my view, wave pools strip away the chaos and artistic nuance that make surfing unique. Watching Gabriel Medina or Filipe Toledo execute flawless routines is awesome no doubt. Once, twice, three times becomes a little dull compared to the natural theatre that is ocean contests. The ocean’s randomness is part of what defines surfing skill. Sometimes, the waves beat the best surfers, and that’s precisely what makes the sport compelling – for a surfer. Is surfing capped at it’s audience capacity because non-surfers don’t understand this ocean factor, and thus this thwarts the sports ability to grow event eyeballs?

Yet for media and sponsors, predictability is king. Repeatable, broadcast-friendly formats are easier to package, sell and monetise. The result is a tension between what the culture values and what the commercial model rewards, or more so demands to remain a viable commercial exchange.

The Cultural Contradiction

And yet, here’s the irony: I loved Street League. The static course, the same rails and stairs for every skater, the repeated runs, it was a real show. Why? Because street skateboarding thrives on interpreting the fixed architecture differently. The creativity is in the rider, not the environment.

Could I watch three SLS events in a row? Perhaps not, it’d also become dull like the wave pool.

That’s not true for all boardriding disciplines. Snowboarding and surfing, by their nature, offer more open-ended possibilities. Yet across all three sports, the commercial model increasingly dictates the format, privileging clarity, structure, and metrics over expression.

Sometimes I’ve watched these contests and forgot it’s actually a competition against athletes. Often it’s simply the athlete against themselves. When a athlete is on a heater within competition, commentators will remark “Oh he’s locking in a video part right now“!

So, Who Benefits and Who Gets Left Behind

This has consequences. The “second-tier” athletes that are highly skilled riders who don’t sit at the pinnacle of the leaderboard are often marginalised. Media numbers dictate opportunity. Sponsors invest where exposure is guaranteed. The competition format rewards consistency and marketable moments rather than pure skill or cultural authenticity. Both Street League and Natural Selection have a very small pool of competitors, it’s a science as broadcasting has a format to adhere to, and, the event can’t go on forever.

Yet these athletes are essential to the culture. They innovate, inspire, and sustain the community. Ideally, formats should create space for them to flourish, independent of top-tier ranking or social media metrics.

Is it valid to assume that with this reality, it shrinks the growth of professional opportunities within the sport itself? Do formats end up being smaller with the same pool of top tier athletes, thus shrink the size of the participation numbers outside of pro ranks and competition?