Let's Discuss

What to look out for in our latest episode.

The New Chapter in Sports Fandom Is Here

What's going on: Sometimes fandom starts with a book. A few chapters later, readers begin following players on Instagram, showing up early to watch warm-ups IRL — and, yes, staring at jawlines. The fiction-to-fandom pipeline is nothing new, but it’s now driving a surge of interest in UK hockey (much like with the NHL in the US), according to the Financial Times. Women now make up nearly half of one league’s 2025 UK attendees — packing and selling out arenas, FT says. Some teams get it, with players reading from sports romance books, like Icebreaker, in the locker room. Others? Not so much. The UK’s governing body for ice hockey called the FT’s framing “absurd and inaccurate.” Maybe just take the W on ticket sales?

Our take: Hockey isn’t the only game thriving on steamy sport-book subplots. F1 has seen a steady rise in female enthusiasts and is in its own fanfic era. Many teams seem to be clearly in on it. Take this slo-mo video of a driver’s postrace ice bath (as if they don’t know exactly what they’re doing). Critics say it’s just sexualizing and dehumanizing the athletes — with allegations that fans can take it too far. But as spectators and teams navigate this new chapter, others say it’s only bringing more women into sports — even if they’re wearing bedazzled jerseys repping a fictional player. Who knows? Their next piece of merch might just come from the team store.

Related: The Sports Romance Books That Should Be First on Your Roster (NYT Gift Link)