With One Day to Go, USATF Still Yet to Announce Broadcast Plans for Saturday Portion of 2025 US Indoor Championships
USATF ended its arrangement with RunnerSpace at the end of 2024
By Jonathan Gault
Friday 2:30 p.m. ET update: The USATF.TV url, which previously housed all of RunnerSpace’s USATF content, now redirects to a site that is offering a pay-per-view stream of the non-televised portion of this weekend’s meet for $9.99. The site says it is powered by Joymo, a Norwegian streaming platform. USATF has confirmed that everything outside of the NBC TV window (1-3 p.m. ET on Sunday) will be shown on the new USATF.TV.
The 2025 USATF Indoor Championships begin on Saturday at the Ocean Breeze Athletic Complex in Staten Island, N.Y. And as of Friday morning — 24 hours before the meet is set to start — there has been no announcement about how (or if) Saturday’s events will be broadcast.
Sunday’s track finals will be shown live on NBC and Peacock from 1-3 p.m. ET, but there is no information available on USATF’s website about how to watch Saturday’s events (which include prelims in the 60m hurdles, 400m, and 800m, as well as finals in the men’s and women’s 3000m) or Sunday’s early field event finals (the men’s and women’s high jump both begin at 11 a.m., two hours before NBC’s broadcast window). A USATF spokesperson was unable to provide an answer to LetsRun.com about where/if Saturday’s events will be shown.
RunnerSpace has broadcast USATF events since 2013 and typically served as the home for events at USATF championships that fall outside of the NBC TV window, with fans able to watch by signing up for a subscription to RunnerSpace+ or USATF.TV. RunnerSpace also broadcast a number of USATF youth and road championships on its platform. However, sources told LetsRun.com that USATF ended its arrangement with RunnerSpace at the end of 2024.
The women’s 3,000m on Saturday is one of the biggest track finals of this year’s US indoor champs (Kevin Morris photo)
Last month’s USATF Cross Country Championships in Lubbock, Tex., a meet that would typically be streamed on RunnerSpace, were not broadcast at all, though that drew little notice, in part because of the small fields and lack of top-tier talent. But the US Indoor Championships are one of USATF’s premier events and, as things stand, fans have no idea how they will be able to watch athletes like Grant Holloway, Hobbs Kessler, Josh Hoey, and Nikki Hiltz compete on Saturday.
Typically, USATF’s broadcast negotiations would have been handled by Chief Content Officer Adam Schmenk, but he left USATF in December and the company has not publicly named a replacement. That has left USATF scrambling to reach a broadcast arrangement for USA Indoors before the meet begins on Saturday.
There is optimism that Saturday’s events will be shown in some fashion. LetsRun.com understands that a broadcast crew is in place in Staten Island for Saturday’s events and that Carr-Hughes Productions, the company that produces NBC’s track & field broadcasts, is in line to produce the broadcast. What remains unclear is how Saturday’s events will be distributed, and whether they will be shown live or only available on pay-per-view after the fact.
