Vin Lananna says that college track & field competitions are dreadful

Only Vin cares about the athletes.

I forgot I also went to the Adidas XC (College Night) meet and The ACC XC Championship. Why? A lot of good athletes/performances and an opportunity to chat with (maybe the few) others who enjoy the sport.

Got any good running recs in the triangle besides the Umstead gravel, American tobacco, and Al Buehler?

Vin Lananna only really cares about the athletes who make him look good, or when there's something in it for him.

vin is the Karen of college running

Agree. Been there, done it. I was the guy as an athlete that made sure I was at an event early enough not to miss a prelim because there was a great athlete competing while my teammates back at the hotel were still sleeping. I was the coach that arrived earliest and left latest because I honored the process of being ready whether it was attending or hosting meets. I created experiences for others that greatly appreciated that it was different, better than most both for athletes, coaches AND spectators. It was always in the details.

What's keeping this sport alive isnt the money but the experience the athletes have that makes them want to continue being a a part of it. A teacher, coach, official, volunteer, groundskeeper, etc... without them, there is no sport or motivation to engage and encourage others. People always have the freedom to decide how involved they want to be. The sport isn't going away. People's idea of it's relevance and the money that supports it may be changing but those closest to it know what the deal is and that's giving people a reason to care. Unfortunately, it's money that is becoming a bigger societal issue and the fact that a larger part of society are sheep to social influence and less critical thinkers. The sport is still worth it globally. We'll figure it out. Club systems vs tax payer funded/university, association regulated etc.... Another unfortunate issue is leadership at the top, USATF. They are the ones who need to spend more time and $$$ promoting and selling it.

Olympic trials 2024. Such an awesome event. I even liked Eugene—great city for bike riding and running

I love track and field. I;ve been involved in the sport for 55 years. I check college, HS results every day. The only events I have attended outside particpating has been millrose games (when it was in the garden) and oly trials in oregon.

After that - with the advent of every lap time being recorded and shown in real time, many meets being online either through a paid service or on youtube - there is no reason to waste a day at a track. I can pretty much follow the races live while doing other work.

I do pay for Runnerspace because they do have meets from years ago in their archive. I will not pay for flotrack or milespilt because i can't stand their business model and flotrack is too costly and milesplit takes videos, results and info from others and they suck.

Same for footbal or baseball.with gameday on mlb.com, nfl.com and nhl.com there's no reason to spend hundreds of dollars going to something i can get at home.

I have thought about going to some invites or state meets near me, but you have to sit there for 9 hours to watch a full meet.

I attended Eugene Worlds, NCAA Prelims and SEC Champs "just to watch." Worlds was special but I enjoyed the college meets almost as much.

When track was huge in the U.S. and commanded full stadiums and SI covers, you had not only dual meets (e.g. US v. USSR) but also great athletes with commanding personas. When our distance runners are not dominant on the world stage and maybe not even our sprinters, you don't get the huge American audiences. The lack of world-level Europeans was gradually killing the sport's most lucrative venues in Europe as well. Now you still might get some guy from Botswana show up on any given day and beat the multi-time American champion, but at least we are competitive for the win on the biggest stage in every event on the men's side from 100m through 10000m now. That cannot help but grow the sport.

I went to USATF in 2013. They came back to Des Moines in 2018. But I decided not to go because it was the non-championship year. Eugene is too far for me to travel.

You can use dual/tri/quad meets as qualifier for the conference championship. Athletes accumulate points throughout the season to qualify for spots in the conference championship. The top athletes in each event get byes to the final. In case someone gets injured, save one wild card in each event for the athlete with the best mark who did not qualify based on points.

That way, regular season meets mean something, and it won't kill the conference championship.

I attend track meets just as a fan. But I will say this, track meets are not "user friendly" anymore.

Vin probably wants to bring baby cinder tracks.

In general the sport takes place in separate buckets, governing bodies, competition formats, and priorities - so it's hard to build fan base when there's no through line for anyone to follow: youth, HS, collegiate, open and elite.

Important topic. This is why I’ve long advocated (to crickets, typically) for the return of not only dual meet rivalries where the competition itself transcends the analytics-based obsession with times, records and qualifiers, but team-oriented pro track leagues/conferences.

Imagine a professional USA-based league of say, 8 teams (4 in the west, 4 in the east), based on geography (NE, Mideast, Atlantic, SE; NW, Midwest, Southwest, Pacific). Teams draft talent from colleges (with incentives to take local talent) plus have room for a few international ringers. Score like traditional meets, with participants paid by both salary and bonuses for wins/points/records. Hire stadium & multimedia announcers who blend informative expertise with palpable excitement like Liggett/Sherwin & Madden/Summerall & Vin Scully; keep the meets tight & moving with variations in relays and other events from meet to meet. Have a culminating East vs West Championship. Play up the personalities of individuals and the events, as well as the history & legacy of each. Work the schedule around major national & international meets. Do this right, and I believe the public will eventually show up in Penn Relays type numbers.

But that is like saying, "the world's problems will be solved if everyone was just SUPER dedicated and motivated." Yet that is not how the world works.

We, as a culture, are on average just AVERAGE. Track has to work in the culture that really exists in America, not in a world where people "show up early and stay late to watch a prelim." That does not scale. Good for you for being that person. We need a sport that is watchable for normal people like our friends and kids.

Yes, I went to see the dual meets at my school, not being good enough to make the team (a good D1 squad)

Lananna is absolutely correct. A series of school v school competitions with no stakes at all, other than the best athletes trying to qualify for conference and NCAA.

So, time trials - and, because of the dual format, a waste of everyone's time because there wasn't enough good competition to do good time trials. Invitationals were unabashedly about time trials, but again so what, the only competition that counted was at nationals.

The school hypers focused on the few athletes with a shot at nationals. Some of them qualified, some of them came in like 5th.

Track is not, can never be and should never be a team sport. Like golf, also not a real team sport, people do it for individual performance. Golf succeeds because its handicap system has everyone competing against everyone. Track will never do that, at least not in the US, because colleges will never loosen their grip on it.

I like the idea of a dual meet season replacing indoor or maybe a semester long dual meet season leading to a team championship running alongside an individual event championship.

teams alternate dual meets with time trial meets through the spring.
i like the idea of a team national championship that’s small enough to follow along at home, be it 2-10 teams.