World's in USA

from what i understand, we don't really have a proper venue for it.

midwesta wrote:

from what i understand, we don't really have a proper venue for it.

Yep, that would be the reason.

the iaaf has been told many times that the american culture differs from theirs. the 2006 world athletics cup in los angeles was cancelled and moved to athens because the u.s. would not pay for the hundreds of iaaf family do-nothings that the iaaf wanted as tag-alongs. the iaaf demanded that airfare, hotel, car, etc. be paid for by the u.s. plus that, the u.s. would not block out 1/4 of the best seats in the stadium for the media tribune, iaaf family, iaaf v.i.p.'s etc. it's just not the way americans do things. it would outrage the u.s. public if these outrageous demands were met. unless the iaaf changes it's policies for events in the u.s., i doubt if there will ever be an WCs in the u.s.

Ok, let's suspend reality for a few seconds and say the US could get over the 'culture clash' with the IAAF, what venue in the US could host the World Championships?

home depot or stanford would be the only place that i can think of. home depot bids in the past included a brand new huge stadium with hammer/discus on the main field as required by the IAAF. stanford's bid included monkeying up the football stadium. both have several tracks next to the main track, hotel capacity, population, media, infrastructure, and good weather in the summertime.

I have a feeling it was torn down, but what happend to the olympic stadium in Atlanta? If that is gone, are there any universities that have large stadiums for such an event?

I think it was turned into a baseball stadium.

Like I said, there is not a current venue that could handle the WC. And, didn't they just remove the track from the Stanford football stadium?

They would add dirt and a track. That's easy. The U.S. built the Panama Canal, Hoover Dam, and sent men to the moon afterall ;-) In 2004 they built a 30,000 seat stadium and with portable swimming pool for the U.S. Swimming Trials in Long Beach. The IAAF only wants world class cities so that has to be considered.

Currently only Fayetteville-McDonald Stad the Auburn Hutbell-Rosen Stad and Icahn in NYC have tracks that are IAAF Class 1 Certified tracks (IAAF required).

Icahn with it's less than 5,000 seats and poor supporting infrastructure(roads,parking,) no second track would need a lot of $$ public and private to make a serious bid. On the Plus side organizations like Bid 2012/ NYSports Commission/RISF etc have strong political support but doubt the economic impact of Worlds is big enough to generate interest.

I have no idea about Auburn and it's stadiun nor if Fayetteville could support the Worlds.

There are a few university stadiums that approach 50,000 in seating capacity, but they're not in any metropolitan areas. Stanford Stadium was the only one available, and did bid for the 1999 and 2003 Worlds, but there big question marks about tv coverage. You have to have a broadcaster to set up the infrastructure, run miles of cable and the IAAF tells them how to do it and how much (if any) money they'll get for it. For almost every other country in the world, this isn't an issue because they have a few state-run channels (BBC, CBC, etc.) that will host it because they want to put on an event for the world to see, whereas all the major broadcasters in the US are private and for-profit.

I believe that for the 1999 and 2003 bids, the CBC was going to come down and help with the TV. But it's a moot point now since they took out the track and restructured the stadium.

I'd love to have Worlds in the US; maybe if the Chicago Olympic bid looks good, a suitable facility will become available.

Fayetteville is not world class. Only L.A., S.F., N.Y., Atlanta, etc. could be considered. But the culture clash between the U.S. and the IAAF makes it impossible. The IAAF is a world of graft and corruption, the IAAF Family delegates, are mainly from the ruling class and miltary families of 3rd World Countries, and they want only the perks, they can care less about the sport. I am certain that we will never see a WC's in the U.S. It's just not possible under the current conditions. At Osaka, the IAAF Family had everything. They didn't even have to go thru security. Yes, a thousand blue credentialed IAAF Family delegates just walked thru, unsearched. Their seats were empty during the finals each evening, as they sat inside the closed air conditioned halls of Nagai Stadium and sipped on wine and ate chesse. The WC's is always as ridiculous as this.

Sorry- Hutsell Rosen Stadium at Auburn.

Old Fish mentioned piggy-backing it onto an OG bid- might be the start- look to other sports that might be attracted to the venue- An Iaaf Cert 1 can contain a Football pitch-soccer- so hosting a WC level match is doable. The stadium might serve as an Equestrain venue,Archery and Field Hockey come to mind, Is Rugby getting a try at OG level?

It's easy to build a suitable stadium, but not easy to build a world class metropolitan area with hotels, transpoortation, intercontinental airport. Plus the weather in Alabama and Arkansas is wickedly humid in the summer.

Weather doesn't really factor in the decision. See Osaka 2007.

NYC aint a charmer in the summer either!!!

Attendance would be as poor as it was in Osaka, Japan.

Although we on this message board would love it, it would be a complete financial disaster.

All of Japan in the summer has terribly humid conditions. With the massive Japanese economic empire that dominates the world, they won out as they often do in many international sports, and world class events. In the U.S. there are areas which have nice weather in the summer and those which have a disgusting level of uncomfortable humidity. The U.S would naturally bid the metro areas with the nice weather to encourage the bid. I know you would too.

Sorry folks, but it doesn't have anything to do with stadiums or what is mentioned in this thread. It is about TAX LAW.

There was an attempt to bring the World Championships to Stanford, but the IAAF has a requirement that the prize money be distributed to athletes TAX FREE in the host nation. If the sponsor cannot get an exclusion for the athletes, they have to reimbuse the prize winning athletes for the taxes. Lacking a Federal law providing exclusion (including sate and local taxes), it is prohibitively expensive to hold in the US and it will never happen.