What exactly were Cinder Tracks like?

Most of the tracks in my high school league were non synthetic including my own high schools.

One track often had a “pool” at one turn and went behind the away bleachers on the back stretch.

Another track had really narrow lanes so that it could “fit” six lanes

Hurdling on those tracks was brutal. Especially for the guys that had synthetic home tracks. In some ways the cinder track was a significant home court advantage. Especially if you were facing a synthetic track squad.

I loved it for training and felt like it was easier on the legs.

If it rained the surface was more similar to a XC course. But I loved it did training especially cause it was easier on the legs. Also when you did race on a synthetic track you felt really fast.

So I would say train on a cinder track if you have the opportunity.

There are cinder tracks in Edmonton, Canada.

I like your idea of covering an all weather track with cinders . I’m sure no school would have a problem with that .

I’ll second the poster who mentioned that unique sound of dragon tooth spikes digging into cinders . Also that feel of racing on a rainy day and having all of those cinders on you after a 2 mile race .

MovieMaker wrote:

3. Cover a 400m track with cinders or dirt

please do option #3 and post pics. I'll even pay the bail bondsman for you.

Cinder tracks had no rebound like synthetic tracks today. The long spikes on your racing shoes would go deep in the cinders with each step and allow you to use the ground to propel yourself. It was a totally different sensation when you ran.

And as somebody mentioned earlier. Running in flats on a cinder track was sort of like playing tennis on clay.

Not fun to run on them on a rainy day

Pre-Jamin Seattle wrote:

Yes I ran on cinder tracks many times growing up in Seattle. Not much different than running on dirt although a bit noisier. Wore contacts and it wasn’t unusual to get stuff kicked up into your eyes. And if it was wet out, your shoes and clothes were filthy afterward. Didn’t have the exotic drainage systems like now so there could be large puddles of water that you were forced to run through. Most of the meets were on the old black asphalt-based artificial tracks, but occasionally there’d be one on cinders. We’d use 3/4” spikes for those, and you didn’t want to get tangled up with other runners with those things flying around.

You are younger than me. I started out exclusively on cinder tracks with an occasional dirt or clay track.

In my junior year of high school we finally got an asphalt track and thought we had died and gone to heaven

it was so much faster.

A few days ago I ran on a rubberized track that was built in 2018. It obviously has energy return and that's the first time I have experienced that! (I did run a a few rubberized tracks in college but there was no energy return, it was like running on the highway.) Today's athletes can do all their training on a track as long as they change directions often.

I remember running in a relays meet in college that was on a cinder track. I lost All of my spikes during one of the relays I ran. I think maybe, just maybe it slowed me down!

I remember a 9th grade teammate of mine who fell on a cinder track. He was covered head to toes in

scratches. Not pretty. I called him Sargent Stripes!

In the 1960s many schools had grass tracks. In fact Peter Snell ran a 3:54 mile on a grass track.

Gee what would be the conversion for that?

looking to discard wrote:

Hard to believe cinders were expensive. Weren't they essentially garbage ?

I mean when all weather tracks became common. No one was buying cinders anymore so it was more beneficial to pay for the all weather surface and not buy cinders once or twice a year.

4 Minute Mi-liar wrote:

Cinder tracks had no rebound like synthetic tracks today. The long spikes on your racing shoes would go deep in the cinders with each step and allow you to use the ground to propel yourself. It was a totally different sensation when you ran.

And as somebody mentioned earlier. Running in flats on a cinder track was sort of like playing tennis on clay.

I ran on almost all cinders all through high school. A couple local colleges had all weather tracks. We always had two PR's per event- cinders and all weather. All weather was always faster.

I ran exclusively on asphalt tracks in high school and then went to college in New England where it was predominantly cinders. No rebound energy, but easier on your legs than those early asphalt tracks which were often essentially road surfaces. They required constant maintenance -- our assistant coach spent most of his spring with shovel and garden tractor getting Weston Field in shape for our few home meets.

I ran on cinders hs and college

On the one hand they were easy on the legs from impact point of view...soft some more so than others.

The spectrum of care was all over the place...some would be fined pressed before every meet practice others looked like a rural path hardly ever rolled.

They used to have this big heavy roller thing that the track owners would roll around the track to smooth it out.

Lines were chalked and hardly fvrr lasted a few races.

The worst part was times were fairly slow by today’s stds...

We used to wear these nasty 2 inch spikes that if you ran too close to the guy ahead of you would go into your shins bad cuts infections gravel stuck in wound

Tracks these days are sweet

It was much harder

While world gone soft

Nasty spikes wrote:

The worst part was times were fairly slow by today’s stds...

Modern day STDs are notably faster

In England, I remember when getting to run on a cinder track, rather than grass was a luxury. Most school tracks were grass, and marked out on the school playing field every spring/summer. We frequently ran on grass tracks in the Southern League (post-school club competition).

The team I originally ran for didn't have cinder track until around 1976, and didn't have a tartan one until the late 80s or early 90s.

As far as cinder tracks in England were concerned, they were generally a brick-red or grey/black color. As others have said, the chalk lines would often be far from straight. The feeling of running on them was totally different to a rubberized track, with longer spikes that dug into the surface.

The condition of them varied throughout a meeting as the inside lane gradually became chewed up (I don't ever remember a roller being used in the course of a meet). In wet it was like a soft porridge, often with puddles; in summer it virtually turned to sand.

If you ran on it in wet conditions, you would tend to end up with half the track on you. This gives an idea-

https://www.gettyimages.ca/detail/news-photo/british-athletes-mike-bullivant-and-martin-hyman-after-a-news-photo/123972581

And that was an international match at the White City, then England's principal track for international meets.

This is Dave Bedford breaking the European record for 10000m at Portsmouth in 1971, and you can see the dust spurts, and how the inside lane is breaking-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kraiMbRQtFc

Since you rarely came across tartan tracks until the mid 70s, cinder was just the way it was...

Thank you for this video! It's wonderful.

My junior high school had a cinder track. Right when I was beginning to run 'seriously' it was great for my mindset, because then, in the late-1970s, I was thinking that the high water mark for distance running was the mid-60s and early-70s. I'd wear basically sprint spikes when I was out there in my mostly white gear, grinding away the efforts.

Then I made the mistake of visiting the concrete track at the high school I'd be at in a year or so. It had been redone with ground-up tires, basically, and was softer now. The junior or senior stud I saw running there in Nike Vainquers showed me that maybe the future had arrived.

How did it sound?

Like eating Cap'n Crunch with your mouth open

You shouldn’t have a hard time finding a cinder track I would think.

Horrible compared to tartan tracks. I could tell the difference right away. Someone had to put chalk for the lanes just before a track meet. If someone fell they would be cut up. One time before my time they would dig up the track for blocks.

I trained on one in Jr. High, but never raced on one. It was a good surface to train on.