Sydney McLaughlin to double in DL Final - an event she's not eligible for - Update: DL will not let her run

Well it's not working. It's simply raised the ire of hardcore fans. The only thing that will work for grand Slam track is having good line-ups. Do you want to watch Sydney run by herself? They need to focus less on marketing and more on announcing more athletes. Paulinho, Nasser, Kazcmarek, Shericka....anything else, and it will be big bust!

It is 1000% a marketing stunt by her management for Grand Slam Track

Generate a fake-ass controversy involving your commercial rival, get a legion of online influencers to talk about it and compare it negatively with your product

Unfortunately the US track influencer accounts going hard on this are inexperienced and just end up sounding totally inorganic and weird - Steve Madness being Exhibit A

The funny thing about this is, as another poster has said, meetings like Brussels virtually sell out weeks, if not months, in advance. It's an extremely popular meeting in Europe. The fans that bought tickets wont care if McLaughlin doesn't run, because a huge number of top stars WILL run.

McLaughlin really isn't that popular globally and few people know her because she chooses to only race in the US. Maybe she is big(ger) in the US. That's great. Then fill yer boots with more US races.

As for Michael Johnsons nonsense track league...does he really think a league with zero field events & virtually no distance events will continue globally, when the RoW outside the USA loves the field & distance events? I see his league becoming the 'American Sprint Track League' and then disappearing after a couple of seasons when the financial backers withdraw...

Seems like they should raise ticket prices

And there you have it - the latest tweet from Grand Slam Track

It's all just a manufactured publicity stunt to promote GST
https://x.com/GrandSlamTrack/status/1831714187090731342

This is a disgrace. The announcement and subsequent retraction makes DL look like clowns relegated to Flotrack where no one will watch it. 🤡

How long until Jesus Christ Her Lord and Savior intervenes?

Already has it would seem.
Its now been announced that race will race in a 400m (friday) and a 200m (saturday) especially created for her, but they will not be designated DL events.

No idea who she will race against as the top athletes in those events will undoubtedly be racing in the actual DL event itself.

This is so stupid.

This kind of worked for them, but MJ/Merber aren't as smart as they think they are and this GST is going to be a mess too.

they confirmed this: https://www.facebook.com/allianzmemorialvandamme/posts/pfbid0x7M1XgDtPidAmDiTjdusnq4GEeXrrq3YFC6oZSqg4ApZhHBoAPr8UYZ5myEcxRgDl

i am so glad that the sanctity of DL and its finals have been protected, that the series will remain untouched by profit-motive, agents, appearance fees, usual suspect-fields, street circuits, or other distortions. and that only the best from all year manifest for the final, there are never any skippers, it's never a shell of an oly/worlds final because people bailed and they included domestics.

as i said the other day, the basic flaw in this is that unlike say the skiing world cup finals, which pull the top skiiers from the circuit per discipline, they usually no show a chunk of the standings, and so it ends up like a normal meet.

my classic example is alex wilson. used to be a regular at the european DL meets. get enough points to make the final by finishing like 6th in the 100 every time. our equivalent of coleman, who breaks 10 and actually wins races, decides to skip, he makes it.

to me DL is half serious meet -- at the front of each pack -- half show. i think this is the "serious meet" folks elbowing in. now, let's be real, this is post-worlds/oly, it's never a full house, not even if you insist on the rules. but i think this is happening perhaps because michael johnson's circuit and ATL have started getting involved. we're not going to let americans parachute in at the end and do stakes races.

i get the technical point and them trying to protect their series perhaps harder than usual, but you are never fixing the attrition problem this time of year, nor is the DL ever immune to being a business and a show, including meet by meet in the events that qualify one for the final. it's not open entry. it's more like if your local track series got to pick who got what meets and then those meets decided who made the final.

and the thing is i think it's bad for track in general to deny a paulino vs. sydney type showdown. that's the sort of thing that elevates this towards oly and worlds. otherwise this is the afterthought part of the schedule defined as much by who doesn't show up as who does.

Just last year Sydney participated in a video documentary in which she essentially bragged about sitting at home and not doing what the system wanted her to do. Well, this time there were consequences. I'll link directly to that segment:

Why is this and the GrandSlam tweet post downvoted. they are stating facts, this is a marketing stunt, ironically by the queen of staying out of the spotlight.

Any other year Syd would be home with her feet up waiting until the next world champs, but all of a sudden she wants to make a stink about Diamond League entry rules, the very same year that a rival/competitor league had been created and has just signed her?

Give me a break, this is an insult to track fans.

Explain why the DL would be in on a Grand Slam Track marketing stunt?

They just agreed to go along with it and announce Sydney would be running on their own site?

We are on stage 3 of the situation flip flop, keep up. Syd now running in a non-DL event (which occurs with other notable athletes from time to time at DL meets) was the compromise offered to her by the DL to allow some perception of saving face by both sides.

Her not being allowed into the DL final official DL recognized event is the stink she raised knowing full-well the rules and expectations prior to the start of the season, and opting not to participate. which allows GrandSlam track to denegrate the DL and claim they will always allow/attract the best in their events through either their full time contract or flexible challenger formats.

Its a distasteful way to fake controversy to attack your competitor. See: US politics via their two major media clown outlets.

Oh you're smoking something good if you think she's not popular and only a few people know her. She's well known around the world. You slow whiny distance lames are jealous because nobody outside of this site could tell you who won the distance races but everyone knows Sydney dominated and won. She does more for this sport than all distance runners combined. Must be tough facing the facts and pouting about them.

Syd is the best

It's hard to do much for the sport when she competes so rarely. She reminds me of the late, great conductor Carlos Kleiber. Universally regarded as the greatest conductor of the second half of the 20th century, but he performed very rarely and turned down invitations all the time. When he performed he was magnificent, but it was immensely frustrating that he did so very rarely. Same with SML.

You still didn't explain why the DL announced that she would be participating in the Final...

Are you saying they weren't aware of their own stipulations?

What has likely happened is other athletes complained about her inclusion and then the DL was forced to backtrack and act like they just realized it was against their own rules

If you think they weren't aware of their criteria before they made the announcement I have several bridges to sell you