empty seats at USATF indoors

Which begs the question: is the athlete responsible for doing what's best for their season or for the sport in their country?

Track doesn't need to be as boring as USATF indoors were. USATF needs to do something to attract the big names to its meet. Things can be a lot better than they are. It is a pathetic situation right now.

If they held it at Arkansas the stands would have been packed.

Tyson Invite wasn't packed. They even took out the whole end zone for Puma and didn't fill gthe seats. Where the hell is Are Kansas anyway ?

Hate 2 say it but it's time they dump the USATF meet people in Indy and hire a new team in Hollywood to put on the TV meets. All of the top TV people in T&F live in L.A. anyways.

I watched the HEPS meet today and it was a whole lot more fun to watch than USATF's....I wouldn't pay a cent or want to spend a second watching the boring nationals meet...the meet was filled with boring races, artificial energy, and empty seats. I just hope USATF recognizes what a disaster the meet was and takes some serious action to correct the situation.

I went to the meet on Saturday, half as many people as at the State HS meet the night before.

I think what would help would be to make it a one day meet instead of spreading the weak fields over two days. It would take longer but they could speed it up by getting rid of the little kids relays and even the hs 4 x 4's. People want to see other people run fast, they can watch the HS kids the night before.

[quote]on the runs wrote:

Which begs the question: Please look up the meaning of that phrase before using it again

reader rabbit wrote:

Really? Like $9-$30 free?

http://www.usatf.org/events/2009/USAIndoorTFChampionships/tickets.asp

Great. I was there. Didn't cost me anything. I don't know what to tell you. You've been duped.

Don't most sponsorship contracts reward for national champs places? If so maybe our athletes don't really need the money....

Let's see, what carries more credibility, something from the official site on USATF.org or something from "studmuffin" on Letsrun.com's message board?

studmuffin wrote:

reader rabbit wrote:

Really? Like $9-$30 free?

http://www.usatf.org/events/2009/USAIndoorTFChampionships/tickets.asp

Great. I was there. Didn't cost me anything. I don't know what to tell you. You've been duped.

They need to bring it back to New York sometimes. Granted, the Armory is a terrible place to watch a track meet, but at least the stands will be filled up.

I was in Boston for work and arranged my schedule so that I was free on Sat afternoon. Took the T over and bought my ticket. Watched most of the afternoon.

There was a dearth of big names and that does not help.

However, I find it interesting that people complain about track not getting more coverage and then a person 10 min away does not go over to show up. Part of what drives more coverage is fan interest.

To me it is one of those things that you show up to support the sport. You never know if it will be great racing or not. Even when all the names show up, the competition can be bad.

Outdoor track isn't that healthy, when you compare attendances to those in in small countries like Switzerland and Norway.

I was there. Anyone could walk in the door and sitdown without any official asking to see a ticket or anything of that nature.

luv2run wrote:

Part of what drives more coverage is fan interest.

To me it is one of those things that you show up to support the sport.

I have been a avid fan for a long time now. At what point is it on T&F (USATF, athletes, TV, sponsors, etc) to put forth a good product. Frankly, as much as I like T&F, I'm just sick and tired of half baked fields and half baked coverage. I have been here for a long time, putting up with all of it. They are driving me away and there is no more I can give as a fan and a supporter of T&F than I already have.

xxxx wrote:

They are driving me away and there is no more I can give as a fan and a supporter of T&F than I already have.

What have you done already?

Good points. Failure to do anything real to clean up the sport has robbed my interest.

the REAL indoors national will be the Seniors at LANDOVER md 3/20-22 /09 - AGES 30 TO 95