I was really disappointed this week to see that the UK do not have an entry into the Ice Hockey in the upcoming Winter Olympics, and it looks as if the predicted medal cache is very small.
What can we expect when we treat a sport like this? As someone said further up the thread, if it doesn't involve football, they're not interested. Makes me sick to be honest, but at the same time proud to be part of an alternative and niche sport.
And then we have Dancing on Ice - a bunch of non-celebs grabbing the limelight in the name of 'reality TV'.....but then, although I hate those sorts of programmes, the more it does to promote the sport, the better.
The sad thing is, the UK has had well established sports for a long time now (football, rugby, cricket, snooker to some extent), so the ice sports have always languished as everyone already has their plates full with those and don't feel like splitting their attention further. When that's the case then there's basically no reason for the mainstream media to really cover it compared to the other sports.
I'm not afraid to admit that ice hockey is what keeps rinks open (along with public sessions). Whole teams paying for practise time and, more importantly, people paying to come and watch games is definitely a bigger money earner than the handful of us figure skaters that could barely make up a full hockey team on patch. But that's the problem, the public have their hands full with our more established sports so people don't really watch ice hockey and rinks don't get the kind of cash they could be and end up closing.
While Dancing on Ice does raise the profile of the sport, the slightly sad thing is that it doesn't even utilise any particular ice skating discipline so it's a complete sham from the perspective of the ice skating community - of course, the general public doesn't know that so it's still beneficial regardless.