Canada’s Aaron Brown has become a voice for the Olympic athletes and has brought forward the industry’s ugly truth. The truth about the enormous pay gap between a champion athlete and someone who finishes fourth. The truth about the financial gap between a “glamorous” sport of swimming versus archery.

Athletes that fall short of the podium have a belief that they have not achieved anything. They are led to believe that they do not deserve financial funding. While the champion athletes that win medals are in a reserved space, they are the ones that earn money and get the sponsorship deals.

Aaron Brown speaks up about the financial reality of athletes

It has always been far too common for world-class athletes who are not able to finish in the top rankings have gone unsponsored.?“Imagine a profession where you need to be a world top 10 just to begin earning a decent wage.”?While the likes of Simone Biles and Michael Phelps are seen in an advertisement almost daily, other athletes depend upon ‘Go Fund Me’ campaigns to earn a decent living.

Simone is not the rule of the industry, but an exception. According to a?survey?of elite athletes from 48 countries, over 50% are financially unstable. Incidentally, this survey was done before the recent pandemic time. The ‘romanticized’ vision of young Olympians is that they are amateurs that do it for the love of the sport and not to get paid.

Comparing the track and field athletes to NFL stars, Brown said, “Mid-tier sprinters can stave off the fastest the NFL offers in terms of raw speed.” The NFL has a much better revenue system in place. As the TV deal increases, so does the salary cap of the players.

34 NFL players currently make $20million a season on average annual salary. While the top earner is QB Patrick Mahomes, who earns a whopping $45million, the minimum annual salary is $660,000.

It’s no wonder that a few track specialists have tried making it into the NFL only for better pay opportunities.

Read More: Why Do Track and Field Athletes Earn Lesser Than Others During Olympics?

Brown’s professional career

Aaron has had a pretty successful career over the years. Specializing in 100m and 200m races, the Canadian’s first medal came in 2009 at the World Youth Championships. He won the silver medal in the 100m event. He then won the bronze medal during the 2010 World Junior Championships in the 200m event. In 2011, Aaron took part in the Pan American Junior Championships. He won bronze in 100m and silver in 4x100m relay events.

Brown has two golds to his name. He won the first during the 2017 World Relay Championships in the 4x200m event and the second came next year at the NACAC championships in the 4x100m event.

He also has a silver medal from the 2018 Commonwealth games in the 200m event. Brown won the bronze medal during the Rio Olympics in the 4x100m relay. He bettered this result in the next Olympics by winning the silver medal in the same event.

While winning will always have its priority in the sport, the rest of the field doesn’t necessarily have to lose.

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