WTF: Can someone please tell me what the heck is going on here with the track at Baylor University (pic)?

POD

Blustery wrote:

When winds are illegal only criminals will have winds.

rojo wrote:

I assuemd with thousands of exccollege track coaches and athletes on this forum that at least one of them would be up on currect track and field design and would easily be able to post the answer.

The fact that no one knows the answer makes it more interesting. A big part of letsrun.com is that is saves everyone time. It's way quick to let the wisdom of the crowd answer stuff.

You are finding out what the wannabe experts posting on here actually know about track and field (not distance running), which is nothing. If you bothered to look at the Baylor facilities page, you would see immediately that the track setup is similar to Occidental College, with very wide turns (maximum legal, probably, like Occidental) and short straights. The straight inside the oval is probably 80 meters or so, thus they built an extension. This structure is pretty common in Europe DL facilities.

A longer extension allows sprinters to warmup with blocks when other events are going on (you cannot do this on just an oval if they have 400m going on filling all lanes). They probably made the extension somewhat longer so that the people in the MVP seats get a good look at the finish.

I'll join the group that is guessing the 150m straight allows running both ways and they ran it with hopes that that days wind would be an aiding one. Mother nature might not have received that memo.

What were the wind direction/readings for women's race and the HH races run that day?

This is pretty easy, right?:

1. They wanted to allow for sprinting in either direction for wind purposes.

2. They didn't want to put the alternate right-to-left course (R2L) on the backstretch, because they don't have adequate seating on the backstretch (and everyone hates that anyway).

3. They didn't want the R2L to finish 80 or 90 meters left of the normal start/finish line because the stands don't go that far left (or barely get that far).

On this last point, most track stands are off-center, and shaded right because of the start/finish line. Go look at Hayward Field -- the regular homestretch stands are shaded right towards the start/finish line, and the backstretch stands are similarly shaded towards the 200m start/alternate 100m finish.

colostomy bag wrote:

rojo wrote:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTzAMxTUz2A

I've never seen a track startup like that.

Can someone please explain the logic behind it?

To run from the specator's right to left is jarring enough, but why do they end in the middle of the stands?

And in this race last weekend with Bromell, why did they go from right to left considering that meant they ran into a headwind?

On that track, when they run left to right, does it end in the middle of the stands as well? Or the normal finish?

-Rojo

PS. Could it be that finishing races in the middle of the straight might actually be better fans? More would be close to the finish.

You must not get out much. Long straight aways are common. Running sprints with the wind is common. Nothing noteworthy about this at all.

Agreed. That's how it was all the time in my high school.

rojo wrote:

The explanations leave a lot to be desired.

No one has explained why it finishes in the middle of the straight away.

When I first saw the setup, I thought perhaps it was set up that way so you could run as many meters as possible with a tail wind (with no grandstand blocking it). The wind gauge is placed in the middle of the straightaway where the the wind could presumably be less. A brilliant strategy to breakt the wind-aided rules.

Of course, the wind was coming from the wrong direction on this day.

So if you know why it starts so far back, please explain it. I guess maybe it starts that far back so the sprinters can set up without delaying the races on the oval.

I know a couple of tracks that have a secondary 100m start line that is as much as 20m behind the normal start line. I never knew the reason and never asked, but I always assumed it was either to allow 100m sprinters to warm up while a race was going on or to have the 100m finish near the center of the grandstands. I never thought it had anything to do with wind.

Looking at it again, the field events look like they end right in the middle too.

The pole vault pit is right at the finish line and the weight throws all have their furthest distances right on about that line.

Do 200m records count if you run them in weird places? Like being able to accelerate in the straight rather than a turn?

The 84.39:115.61 straight to turn ratio is what the IAAF suggests for Class 1 tracks.

The finish in the middle is different at the new facility, but the old facility had a extended straight at the same spot. It is what Coach Hart has always had and used it extensively in practice and made practice with multiple groups at one time run much easier. Sprinters can drill, while 400/distance runners are doing work on the oval without collision risk. Looks strange because the extended straight is at the opposite end from where it usually is. I am not sure, but I think I was told that the middle finish was a nod to spectators and does make it much clearer who is leading/wins for a much bigger area of people in the stands. As for the wind, it predominately comes from the south off the river, must have just turned around slightly for that race. Facility is a little different, but from what I have seen and heard it is a great place to watch a meet.

My old high school 440 yd dirt track started and finished in the middle. It was always strange for me as a high schooler to run with a long straight away at the big meets. The track was build in the 1960s

The sprints all started far back so that they could finish in the middle.

Back in the days of the straight 200m, they even had a ridiculously far back starting line.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/200_metres_straight

In this case I would assume that it has something to do with the wind or like someone else mentioned, to speed up the heats. Having two staging/starting areas and two finish lines with different cameras seems like an ingenious idea!

the UCLA track does some reverse running. You should look into that for some more answers...

rojo wrote:

The explanations leave a lot to be desired.

No one has explained why it finishes in the middle of the straight away.

When I first saw the setup, I thought perhaps it was set up that way so you could run as many meters as possible with a tail wind (with no grandstand blocking it). The wind gauge is placed in the middle of the straightaway where the the wind could presumably be less. A brilliant strategy to breakt the wind-aided rules.

Of course, the wind was coming from the wrong direction on this day.

So if you know why it starts so far back, please explain it. I guess maybe it starts that far back so the sprinters can set up without delaying the races on the oval.

When I started at Hughson, I had no ideas what all of the marking on the curb of the track meant. The only thing painted there was lines of different colors (which did not match up with the standard colors used in track marking). Apparently, before my time, 100m and 100/110H races started way back away from the stands and ran the wrong way to the finish line right at the middle of the home straight. To make matters even more interesting, the track was marked (as I found out after the fact), to have all races finish mid straight. That means the relay exchange zones were, mid curve, mid back stretch, and mid curve.

Since I had no idea what the markings meant and since they were totally unfamiliar to me, I painted the enitre 440y curb white, re-measured the turn radius and track width, gave the dimensions to our trigonometry teacher, and had him come up with the measurements for the track to be marked like every other track I'd seen before in my life.

This did not go over well with the old timers around here. At our first home meet, I actually had people coming out of the stands and yelling at me for marking the track the way I had done. Somebody who had run track years before actually took his concerns to the district superintendant (who was the former track coach). The superintendant sent me an e-mail with his concerns and I told him that whoever had contacted him was a coward for not talking to me first, before going all the way to the top of the food chain to complain. Apparently the superintendant thought I was calling him a coward, so the next day, I was called into the AD's office to explain to him and the principal why I felt it was necessary for me, who had only been working at Hughson for 6 months, to call the district's beloved superintendant a coward.

So, yeah....tracks used to be measured that way so that races could start and finish right in front of the bulk of the spectators, press box, etc...

The track still has the same layout today, although we start and finish in the same spot everybody else does now.

rojo wrote:

I assuemd with thousands of exccollege track coaches and athletes on this forum that at least one of them would be up on currect track and field design and would easily be able to post the answer.

The fact that no one knows the answer makes it more interesting. A big part of letsrun.com is that is saves everyone time. It's way quick to let the wisdom of the crowd answer stuff.

I assuemd that the exccollege people have no idea what the currect answer is. A big part of letsrun.com is that we waste time trying to figure out what rojo is trying to write instead of what he is actually writing. Am I currect?

co-flounders wrote:

rojo wrote:

I assuemd with thousands of exccollege track coaches and athletes on this forum that at least one of them would be up on currect track and field design and would easily be able to post the answer.

The fact that no one knows the answer makes it more interesting. A big part of letsrun.com is that is saves everyone time. It's way quick to let the wisdom of the crowd answer stuff.

I assuemd that the exccollege people have no idea what the currect answer is. A big part of letsrun.com is that we waste time trying to figure out what rojo is trying to write instead of what he is actually writing. Am I currect?

Rojo, for your information, those little red lines under most of the words that you type mean that they are misspelled. Is there never an adult nearby to help you with your spelling problem?

I assume that the ex college coach RoJo should know the answer.

When I was in HS the home straight was 240/250 yards long and the common finish line was in the middle of the home straight. The 100, 110HH, 220, and 220 LH could be run in what ever direction provided a tail wind. The 220 and 220 LH could even be run around the curve as is common today. It was not uncommon to run the 220 as one long straight shot.

This setup also worked well with relay meets where the 220 yd low hurdles legs would be run in opposite directions. The even numbered lanes would run left to right and the odd numbered lanes would run right to left. Made for some interesting crashes if one caromed out of their lane after hitting a hurdle.

Everyone initially thought it was weird when the common finish line was moved to the end of the home straight.

Would great to watch, but the a-holes at Flo took down the video from YouTube. And now they have announced their greatly overpriced "universal" plan. Their business model doesn't make sense?

LOL at "universal plan". AT the rate things are going for their streams, it will be little else but universal disappointment for those trying to watch. WT_? Expanding a product's offering that they haven't even gotten right in the first place?!

Just saw this thread. Was actually at the meet. BU alum covered most of it and as for why they ran with a head wind well it was a swirling, changing wind much of the day and was gusting more during the afternoon sections but calmed by evening. The 100 seemed to have more of a tail coming out of the south that day so thats what they chose even if it meant some slight headwinds.

The track set up has a 180m straight away and the ability to run in reverse and finish in front of the stands instead of in area where there are no bleachers is a no brainer when facility allows. Great sightlines.

I was impressed by crowd that showed up to watch. All in all a great facility and nice to have a meet with decent fan support

A-hole with a whistle wrote:

Would great to watch, but the a-holes at Flo took down the video from YouTube. And now they have announced their greatly overpriced "universal" plan. Their business model doesn't make sense?

Lame. Selling track & field.

Not sure what's going on there but the website is a disaster, their video quality is awful, and it's not worth the price.