The week prior to Miami has Adidas, Drake, Penn, and a DL and there is a DL the same weekend.
April 22 - USATF Road Mile April 25-26 - Drake Relays April 26 - Adidas Road to Records April 26 - Penn Relays April 26 - Xiamen Diamond League May 2-4 - Grand Slam Miami May 3 - Shanghai Diamond League
I see this as a potential problem for Johnson and his organization.
Can't imagine many athletes are sitting at home, watching this, and thinking "Yeah, this looks like a good way to spend my season"
I think they'll really struggle to fill the next meets, especially at 8/15 and 3/5K
Beamish, Hoare and Klecker. They ain’t winning anything noteworthy anytime soon so they may as well get some rent money. Throw in McDonald and Vissa for good measure.
A challenger will make more money finishing 7th out of 8 runners at Grand Slam than he/she would by WINNING the Olympic Trials.
Do we know how athletes were selected? I imagine there were quite a few who will never get a $10k appearance fee that would have made this even more competitive. Props to Michael Johnson for putting up the money.
Hard to imagine he can keep this up long term without a TV contract / serious fan engagement. Assuming everyone on this site is a track fan, we should be pretty happy to be getting additional quality track content. I refuse to pay to watch track, but I'll watch on YT or live TV, read about it, and tell a friend.
Now imagine if betting on this gets mainstream... does it seem odd that this reminds of horse racing? Multiple events that are a few weeks apart where fatigue, distance, and injuries all play a major role? That event does well bc of the pomp and circumstance around it and the HUGE $ that gets bet on it. Let's have one of these meets in Vegas!
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I see this as a potential problem for Johnson and his organization.
Can't imagine many athletes are sitting at home, watching this, and thinking "Yeah, this looks like a good way to spend my season"
I think they'll really struggle to fill the next meets, especially at 8/15 and 3/5K
What I think is at play is how much more beneficial it is to be a challenger in all of this.
I would absolutely hate to be on the ticket for another 3 of these. Each event is basically 6 days away from home and you have another 3 to do in the next 10 weeks? No thanks. Especially if you are Hoey or Kessler - genuine 800/1500 threats that can legitimately win 100k at one of these. I genuinely think that it's possible none of the "racers" in this group actually win one of these. I wouldn't bet against it, but it's certainly not implausible.
3000/5000 Schweizer 8:25.70 US #4/14:26.34 US #3 Houlihan 8:26.66 US #6/14:23.92 US #2 Andrews 8:29.77 US #10/14:43.36 US #9 Mackay 8:35.35 US #20/14:45.81 US #12 Valby 8:34.95 US #15/14:41.44 US #20
800/1500 Wiley 1:56.83 US #5/3:59.17 US #13 ** Mackay 1:57.87 US #21/3:55.90 US #3 ** Maclean 1:58.77 US #40/3:58.31 US #12 Hurta-Klecker 1:57.53 US #14/4:01.79 US #27 Mu 1:54.97 US #1/4:03.44 US #42
** Wiley, Mackay, and Mary Decker Slaney are the only Americans to ever go sub-1:58 and sub-4:00
They should invite CPT for a mid-distance group at one of the future slams since he stepped up for a long-distance spot when they needed someone.
He would be even more uncompetitive in the mid-distance group. His indoor 5k is his highest WA performance score, and his 3k and 1500 are comparable. So unless the goal is to give someone for Kerr to beat in the 800, can't see him getting another call up.
MaClean and Hurta have already had their opportunity and came away with $15K and $20K, respectively. I can see both Mackay and Wiley doing this and getting big pay checks. I don't know if we will see Mu before June, so that would only leave LA for her if she chooses to run. Her 1500 is just not impressive enough to win the big money.
Schweizer and Houlihan would have been almost unbeatable at this a couple years ago but KS seems to have moved to more 5K/10K. She might struggle at 3K the way Cranny did. Houlihan would be a beast after seeing her race 3K indoors. Without a current sponsor, Shelby will look for money opportunities.
I wouldn't be surprised to see all of these ladies in a GST event this year, and a few in Athlos in the fall.
They announced the full fields for the Jamaica meet three weeks out. That means they could release the new field by the end of this week.
What challengers would you want to see?
Men's 800/1500 - Kessler, Hoey
Men's 3000/5000 - Blanks, Young
Women's 800/1500 - Wiley, Mackay
Women's 3000/5000 - Valby, Schweizer
A specialty Women’s 400/800 featuring - Athing Mu, Mary Moraa, Anna Hall, Shafiqua Maloney, and professional debuts in the 800m for Femke Bol and Isabelle Whittaker.
(Let me dream.)
49.24 runner Isabella Whitaker makes sense for the GST Philadelphia Meet, she has no more NCAA Outdoor Eligibility (I think she has 1 more Indoor Season) she ran for UPENN for 4 Years) Aaliyah Butler in the Long Sprints 400/200 and Twanisha Terry in the Short Sprints 100/200 make sense for Miami as both are South Florida girls who ran fo Miami Northwestern High School, But Butler wont this year as Miami is right before SEC's