Indoorisation of Outdoor Sports

Indoorisation of Outdoor Sports

Summary indoorisation of outdoor sports :

At the beginning, sports like futsal, table tennis were indoor so it was miniature versions of sports

especially adapted to indoor place, then activities cardiovasculars (e.g : cycle, fitness) were adapted,

and then typical outdoor lifestyle sportslike ski, biathlon, rowing (which used to be exclusively

practiced in natural environments) were adapted to become indoor sports, entrepreneurs take the

opportunities to develop business with this kind of sports.

We have many terms to define these kind of sports:

"Lifestyle sports" Wheaton, "Alternative sports" Rinehart, "Whiz sports" Midol, "Extreme sports"

Tomlinson

Actually these terms are created for outdoor sports which usually take place in wild and desolate

natural place (ski, surf), of course there are a lot of differences between indoor and outdoor versions

of these sports.

Many questions related to the adaptation:

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Control of indoor environment

Efficiency, safety and predictability

Variation ,challenges and change

Marketing, packaging

Consumer participation

To answer, there was a research project with 31 students from Utrecht University in 2007, they

interview 81 persons in 14 indoor sports centres in the Netherland (12 owners/managers, 50 indoor

participants, 7 outdoor participants).

Factors of the progression of these centres :

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Acceleration in globalization

Commercialization

Technological change

The first indoor ski centre was created at the end of 1980s in 1988 (Australia)then others centres

was developed in Japan, then in Netherlands, GB, Belgium and Germany.

Different technologies are used in order to create the centres:

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Cooling

Insulation techniques

Innovations in water snow and atmospheric control

Marketing, this aspect is important to give a meaning to the new products and services, to permit

to the consumers to understand and appreciate these activities. These centres uses advertisement,

Internet, stories…

Goffman define a constant process between the producers