The doubling part, while intriguing, makes absolutely no sense. It has created a situation where Yared Nuguse could finish third in both the 800 and 1500 and still be crowned the GST champion. Where, inexplicably, hurdlers are forced to race on the flat. Where there are two 200- and two 400-metre races at each meet, which makes no sense even for track fanatics, let alone casual fans. And where distance runners have to face off twice in three days.
Wouldn't it be better to have the best of the best face off in their preferred event and then incentivise them to double up with additional compounded prize money or points that contribute to their overall tally for the season? For example, if SML races and wins the 400-metre hurdles she picks up, say, $75,000, but if she adds the 400 flat she could bank an additional $150,000 because it is her second event. And it would be truly meaningful because she would be up against the best 400-metre runners, not 400 hurdlers.
Anyway, for all the quibbles, really looking forward to seeing how this format plays out. It could go either way. The athlete lineup, branding and broadcast team look A+, but the locations and stadiums look D-.
I think it's interesting that it's marketed as "Only the Fastest" but they've forgotten to add (...primarily from North and Central America).
For example - CPT has just been announced as a replacement challenger. He's a fine runner, but he's never made it out of the semis at a major champs. His distinction is he's the "fastest" if you limit it to only Canada (~3:33).
Thank you for your response and I admit that my post is a bit hyperbole.
Your point is well taken, but that is part of my reasoning. The Chiefs vs Eagles in the Super Bowl is still the Chiefs vs Eagles regardless of which players are healthy or injured. That is not the same for Hocker vs. Nuguse (I know these guys have not bailed). That is why I worry about the product.
I appreciate GST trying to bring something new but;
I would want to see 3 to 4 teams of athletes compete against each other. We would still get individual rivalries, but it would also allow athletes to switch in and out of races if a team has a roster of 10 athletes per event and only races 4 - 6.
Furthermore, these athletes would be partially contracted by their teams taking the pressure off GST. These teams would also provide marketing and give viewers a more definitive athlete group to support.
These teams could be shoe brands, puma, Nike, etc... or perhaps more excitingly a blend of sponsors working under a team name (like pro cycling).
Just my 2 cents. Seems more interesting than what has effectively become another undermarketed meet.
What makes sport compelling? Competition, excellence, rivalries, personality, real stakes, and local/regional/national success.
Track and field is the biggest sport in the biggest competition in the world outside the World Cup. The Olympics bring the drama, the attention, the national rivalries, the attention to personalities, the best competitors and competition, the personal rivalries, and the real stakes, because the Olympic gold is the most coveted prize in track and field. To get fans interested outside of championships, GST is trying to get the rivalries and names. American success not only in the sprints and jumps but in the distances now is going to bring a lot more fandom, just as the promise in the sprints and distances (Gout Gout and Cameron Myers) brought out the 10,000+ fans in Australia recently. Jim Ryun used to fill stadiums. They used to pack stadiums for USA-U.S.S.R. or East Germany meets. We could definitely go back to more nation v. nation dual up to quad meets. Getting the stars to participate is key as well.
I for one like the idea of GST, who doesn't want to see top athletes compete across the year? Who doesn't want to see what they can do outside their comfort zone? How many threads has Letsrun had regarding "What could Bolt run the mile in?", "How slow is Jakob at 800" etc.
It's year one, and despite being a UK fan with no domestic events this still has me interested. It may be doubly interesting to see how GST athletes perform at World Champs having had to race their ways into shape; I am very supportive of having an event other than the diamond league, and I'm sure many athletes are as well from a financial perspective. There is a huge market for running, everyone is a hobby jogger these days, but elite T&F will not reach them with limited events per year and without trying something new.
F1 didn't do anything fundamentally different, it's simply expanding into a new market.
The US market is simply not interested in distance running, and changing the format to place an emphasis on rivalries is unlikely to change that.
For many of the reasons already listed, track has some fundamental challenges as an individual sport and the current infrastructure makes it difficult to overcome them.
I think there is a lot of criticism from people like yourself on the differences in format, whether it’s the doubling, Racers/Challengers, etc. and not the result of those changes.
Look at the actual product: the races.
It is the first week of April and you will see the podium of the men’s 1500m facing off against 1-2-4 in the 800m. The Olympic 200m Champion is racing the Olympic 400m Champion… twice!
The athletes are very excited and I think most track fans are too. What college meet were you going to otherwise watch this weekend?
And I appreciate the dialogue!
Kyle, thanks for coming on here and talking about GST! Unlike many of the folks on this thread, I think it's overall a very positive thing and I'm excited to watch it. Can't overstate how much better it is for the athletes than DL, where the organizers said for years from their mansions in Monaco that they just didn't have the money to pay athletes more for appearances and prizes, then GST comes along and suddenly they can double the DL prize money and it's still nothing compared to that of GST. Also the well-known detail about favoritism with agents and certain meets that frustrates many top athletes who somehow can't get into DL lineups for years. However I have a few criticisms/things I'm worried about with the grand slam format:
1. As another poster mentioned, hurdlers being overrepresented. It's good to have them since generally hurdlers love to race each other a lot (except Rai Benjamin who was pretty vocally against GST), but are the storylines of this many races with hurdlers really that compelling?
2. The 3-day format. I'm actually gonna complain about the opposite of what many people are upset about on here- why not have the athletes double over the course of two days? Everyone is saying the doubling is bad and too hard on the athletes, but I'd argue against it. The world's best athletes should absolutely be fit enough to run two races in two days, even in the 3k/5k group. They do it in Boston during indoor, sometimes on the same day with chasing standards and then pacing, so I see no reason why they can't do it over two days in potentially slower/tactical races. Many came out of the collegiate system that requires a lot of doubling with short periods in between. I think it's a sad state the sport is in where a lot of pro athletes can sandwich hard workouts back to back, or work out after a hard time trial race, but they push back so much when asked to race the same guys twice in a weekend.
Making everything happen in two days is so much more appealing to spectators. I think designing a three day meet is out of touch with the way that most adults and Americans think/plan their lives. It's like the Eugene problem- die hard fans will go there, but it's way harder to get new fans into the sport by hosting there, and then you get an empty stadium at WCs just six years away from hosting the Olympics in the US... a huge wasted opportunity, but let me get back on subject here.
For example, I think the Philly meet is gonna be awesome but I know some hardcore track fans in DC, which is not very far for a world class meet, who are discouraged from going because they don't know how they'd be able to see all three days. DL meets have a bunch of events in one day fit into a compact TV window, and this is probably the one good thing about them that you should take note of. I hope it is amended to two days next season, and I appreciate any commentary or response to this if you have the time!
For many of the reasons already listed, track has some fundamental challenges as an individual sport and the current infrastructure makes it difficult to overcome them.
I think there is a lot of criticism from people like yourself on the differences in format, whether it’s the doubling, Racers/Challengers, etc. and not the result of those changes.
Look at the actual product: the races.
It is the first week of April and you will see the podium of the men’s 1500m facing off against 1-2-4 in the 800m. The Olympic 200m Champion is racing the Olympic 400m Champion… twice!
The athletes are very excited and I think most track fans are too. What college meet were you going to otherwise watch this weekend?
And I appreciate the dialogue!
Kyle, thanks for coming on here and talking about GST! Unlike many of the folks on this thread, I think it's overall a very positive thing and I'm excited to watch it. Can't overstate how much better it is for the athletes than DL, where the organizers said for years from their mansions in Monaco that they just didn't have the money to pay athletes more for appearances and prizes, then GST comes along and suddenly they can double the DL prize money and it's still nothing compared to that of GST. Also the well-known detail about favoritism with agents and certain meets that frustrates many top athletes who somehow can't get into DL lineups for years. However I have a few criticisms/things I'm worried about with the grand slam format:
1. As another poster mentioned, hurdlers being overrepresented. It's good to have them since generally hurdlers love to race each other a lot (except Rai Benjamin who was pretty vocally against GST), but are the storylines of this many races with hurdlers really that compelling?
2. The 3-day format. I'm actually gonna complain about the opposite of what many people are upset about on here- why not have the athletes double over the course of two days? Everyone is saying the doubling is bad and too hard on the athletes, but I'd argue against it. The world's best athletes should absolutely be fit enough to run two races in two days, even in the 3k/5k group. They do it in Boston during indoor, sometimes on the same day with chasing standards and then pacing, so I see no reason why they can't do it over two days in potentially slower/tactical races. Many came out of the collegiate system that requires a lot of doubling with short periods in between. I think it's a sad state the sport is in where a lot of pro athletes can sandwich hard workouts back to back, or work out after a hard time trial race, but they push back so much when asked to race the same guys twice in a weekend.
Making everything happen in two days is so much more appealing to spectators. I think designing a three day meet is out of touch with the way that most adults and Americans think/plan their lives. It's like the Eugene problem- die hard fans will go there, but it's way harder to get new fans into the sport by hosting there, and then you get an empty stadium at WCs just six years away from hosting the Olympics in the US... a huge wasted opportunity, but let me get back on subject here.
For example, I think the Philly meet is gonna be awesome but I know some hardcore track fans in DC, which is not very far for a world class meet, who are discouraged from going because they don't know how they'd be able to see all three days. DL meets have a bunch of events in one day fit into a compact TV window, and this is probably the one good thing about them that you should take note of. I hope it is amended to two days next season, and I appreciate any commentary or response to this if you have the time!
Two days is the way to go. Just like diamond league final.
mens 1500/800 group is already back to back days, if im reading the schedule correctly. A Saturday evening to Sunday Afternoon would be way more fan friendly.
Kyle, thanks for coming on here and talking about GST! Unlike many of the folks on this thread, I think it's overall a very positive thing and I'm excited to watch it. Can't overstate how much better it is for the athletes than DL, where the organizers said for years from their mansions in Monaco that they just didn't have the money to pay athletes more for appearances and prizes, then GST comes along and suddenly they can double the DL prize money and it's still nothing compared to that of GST. Also the well-known detail about favoritism with agents and certain meets that frustrates many top athletes who somehow can't get into DL lineups for years. However I have a few criticisms/things I'm worried about with the grand slam format:
1. As another poster mentioned, hurdlers being overrepresented. It's good to have them since generally hurdlers love to race each other a lot (except Rai Benjamin who was pretty vocally against GST), but are the storylines of this many races with hurdlers really that compelling?
2. The 3-day format. I'm actually gonna complain about the opposite of what many people are upset about on here- why not have the athletes double over the course of two days? Everyone is saying the doubling is bad and too hard on the athletes, but I'd argue against it. The world's best athletes should absolutely be fit enough to run two races in two days, even in the 3k/5k group. They do it in Boston during indoor, sometimes on the same day with chasing standards and then pacing, so I see no reason why they can't do it over two days in potentially slower/tactical races. Many came out of the collegiate system that requires a lot of doubling with short periods in between. I think it's a sad state the sport is in where a lot of pro athletes can sandwich hard workouts back to back, or work out after a hard time trial race, but they push back so much when asked to race the same guys twice in a weekend.
Making everything happen in two days is so much more appealing to spectators. I think designing a three day meet is out of touch with the way that most adults and Americans think/plan their lives. It's like the Eugene problem- die hard fans will go there, but it's way harder to get new fans into the sport by hosting there, and then you get an empty stadium at WCs just six years away from hosting the Olympics in the US... a huge wasted opportunity, but let me get back on subject here.
For example, I think the Philly meet is gonna be awesome but I know some hardcore track fans in DC, which is not very far for a world class meet, who are discouraged from going because they don't know how they'd be able to see all three days. DL meets have a bunch of events in one day fit into a compact TV window, and this is probably the one good thing about them that you should take note of. I hope it is amended to two days next season, and I appreciate any commentary or response to this if you have the time!
Two days is the way to go. Just like diamond league final.
mens 1500/800 group is already back to back days, if im reading the schedule correctly. A Saturday evening to Sunday Afternoon would be way more fan friendly.
While I agree with you, it's gotta be about the money/inventory. It's year one, so let's see how it goes. Eventually, I'd love some small tweaks like:
-3K/5K group does either 3K/1500 double (2 slams) or straight-up 5K with a pacer (2 slams). If you need more inventory in the 5K slams you do a Steeple.
-Only one 100, 200, and 400. Simplest way to do this is to have hurdlers single up, and have solely the racers double back for the 200 on Day 2. You can mess around with this format if you are able to get athletes as challengers who are really exciting in the 200 like Lyles/Tebogo/Alfred/Shericka.
-Yes this makes the meet smaller/shorter, but it gives fans nonstop exciting action and little redundancy.
This post was edited 58 seconds after it was posted.
And in defense of Grand Slam Track- why all the naysayers? They're trying something new, Give it a chance.
They want it to fail and that's weird
Its not weird. Some people take delight in other people failing. It makes perfect sense from an evolutionary perspective. The good, ie the growers, must shame those people so they spoil less. We have a giant enabling system for these people who essentially are failing at life and want to drag other people down with them. I know this because I have these feelings myself at times.
Massive respect to Kyle for coming on here. I would much rather leaders of things be honest put themselves out there. We need positive people to stand up for what's right and drown out the voices of the naysayers. They will always be with us because it is human nature. Given how much hate there is in the world it is not surprising leaders avoid making themselves public.
Note well that just because your good, successful, well adjusted and pro community you will still get haters. You won't please some people unless you fail. Don't give it to them.
Looking forward to the meets and the future of athletics. Let's go!
Makes sense. I thought/think it's crazy that athletes would show up for free at random college meets unless it's a glorified practice.
Christian Coleman is the same training group as Sha'Carri so if this means they're on similar schedules e.g. China/Japan DL/Cont tour Gold meets and then likely Pre and NYCGP (or something similar domestically), I got no problem with it. Coleman's proposed schedule also could allow for the LA Grand Slam.
The problem is the athletes doing neither the GST nor competitive meets globally. It's actually more Jamaicans who seem the culprits of this than Americans when it comes to the early part of the season. Though, Bobby Kersee is not blameless of course.
This post was edited 2 minutes after it was posted.
Two days is the way to go. Just like diamond league final.
mens 1500/800 group is already back to back days, if im reading the schedule correctly. A Saturday evening to Sunday Afternoon would be way more fan friendly.
While I agree with you, it's gotta be about the money/inventory. It's year one, so let's see how it goes. Eventually, I'd love some small tweaks like:
-3K/5K group does either 3K/1500 double (2 slams) or straight-up 5K with a pacer (2 slams). If you need more inventory in the 5K slams you do a Steeple.
-Only one 100, 200, and 400. Simplest way to do this is to have hurdlers single up, and have solely the racers double back for the 200 on Day 2. You can mess around with this format if you are able to get athletes as challengers who are really exciting in the 200 like Lyles/Tebogo/Alfred/Shericka.
-Yes this makes the meet smaller/shorter, but it gives fans nonstop exciting action and little redundancy.
Do you mean a separate event group for the steeple? I agree that if they're running a 5k, you shouldn't expect them to double. But no serious 5k guy is also running a steeple so it would mean GST expanding it's roster.
I've been pretty skeptical of GST, but as the events get nearer, I find I'm more excited about the GST distance races than the DL distance races. I know I'm getting Kerr, Nuguse, and Hocker going balls to the wall for the win in GST. The DL distance races are just a succession of Jakob Vs the clock races and I'm kind of done with those. If there's a stated WR attempt by Jakob, I'm invested, but otherwise, it's GST for the distance races. The sprints are a different matter. The men's 100m at the first DL already looks better than GST and that's got to hurt MJ a bit, as a big sprint guy
Do you mean a separate event group for the steeple? I agree that if they're running a 5k, you shouldn't expect them to double. But no serious 5k guy is also running a steeple so it would mean GST expanding it's roster.
I've been pretty skeptical of GST, but as the events get nearer, I find I'm more excited about the GST distance races than the DL distance races. I know I'm getting Kerr, Nuguse, and Hocker going balls to the wall for the win in GST. The DL distance races are just a succession of Jakob Vs the clock races and I'm kind of done with those. If there's a stated WR attempt by Jakob, I'm invested, but otherwise, it's GST for the distance races. The sprints are a different matter. The men's 100m at the first DL already looks better than GST and that's got to hurt MJ a bit, as a big sprint guy
Yeah what I am saying is you single but pay them half as much for that slam (or maybe 2/3). You bring in a steeple group with the cost savings for a one-off or two-off. Steeplers don't get paid too much anyway, I can't imagine you'd have much trouble getting the Rooks, Beamish, Kibiwot, the Serems, Sime et al while offering strong prize money. Girma and El Bakkali probably tougher, but I still like your chances.
I'm completely with you on the GST's strength in mid-distance and distance. The China meets will have a few stars (Kipyegon), but in general it's gonna be a lot of B-teamers trying to hit qualifying marks or secondary athletes. Sprints-wise, the DL did a surprisingly good job recruiting. In past years, the DL 100 has been a dumpster fire. This year it could actually be reasonably good.
This post was edited 6 minutes after it was posted.
I guess the main question is what value would a steeple bring to GST? Probably not many more eyeballs. An alternative is to have the 5000 as a single event but prize money only pays out every second meet rather than every single meet. It still puts a potential $200,000 on the table over the course of four meets, which is more than most athletes could earn anywhere else. Whatever the answer, I think something will need to change with the 3k/5k group. I can't see it working long term. It's too many races, too close together for most athletes. On the positive side, I think it might be the most unpredictable event group simply because there'll be so much variation in how people respond to doubling back. Fatigue is going to lead to some unexpected results
And in defense of Grand Slam Track- why all the naysayers? They're trying something new, Give it a chance.
They want it to fail and that's weird
Agreed. That said, I think people have legit concerns about the format, which I share: the 3-day format and the forced doubling. I want GST to succeed, and I'm concerned that the 3-day format and forced doubling will make it less likely to succeed. I'd be happy if I was wrong about that.