Grand Slam Track Kingston: A Bold Step Forward, A Stumble Out of the Blocks, and a Word of Caution for the Diamond League and Athlos
By Weldon JohnsonThe eyes of the track world were on Kingston, Jamaica, this past weekend where Michael Johnson’s much-anticipated Grand Slam Track (GST) series kicked off its inaugural season.
The concept—a new format where athletes double across two events over three days, chasing points and a hefty $262,500 in prize money per event group— was ambitious, yet untested. What unfolded was a mixed bag of some brilliant performances, some uneven races, and a glaring disappointment— the largely empty National Stadium, where a raucous atmosphere was meant to launch this league into the stratosphere.
So I want to look at what went right and what went wrong with Grand Slam Track’s launch as well as the future of GST, all with an eye on the Diamond League and Athlos, which were gratuitously patting themselves on the back this past weekend.
The athletes got paid
Some of the $100,000 winners in Kingston. (Kevin Morris photo)
Congratulations to Michael Johnson and his team for lift-off. It is easy to be the critic, and we at LetsRun.com had many areas of concern about the league before launch — some of which came true — but it is much harder to be in the arena.
After three days in Kingston, 12 athletes left with $100,000 1st-place checks, and a total of $3.15 million in prize money was awarded. The Diamond League, after 15 years of existence, will award just $2.24 million at its 2025 final and an average of $500,000 per regular season meet. That pales in comparison to GST. If the Diamond League was delivering on its potential and history, there would be no need for Grand Slam Track.
This was a major win for the track athletes who took part. Last place in every event took home as much as the regular season Diamond League winners in the past (a few Diamond League winners this year will take home $20,000 for 1st — by comparison, that is what a 5th place finisher gets at GST). Granted they had to work twice as hard by doubling, but still very impressive. Doubling is definitely a hindrance in attracting athletes, but the athletes who didn’t compete will see the big checks the others took home and contemplate doing it in the future.
Fantasy matchups that delivered…
Grand Slam Track is designed to produce fantasy matchups by incentivizing athletes to run events they normally wouldn’t enter against top competition. Some of those matchups in Kingston delivered incredible races. Olympic 200m champ Gabby Thomas faced off vs Olympic 400m champ Marileidy Paulino in the 400, and Paulino suffered her first 400 defeat in nearly two years. But even though Thomas ran 49.14 — in April! — she was not the winner. Salwa Eid Naser got the win in a blistering 48.67. This was a mouth-watering matchup any time of the year and it matched the hype.
The men’s 1500m was the most anticipated distance race heading into Kingston and it may have exceeded expectations as none of the Olympic 1500m medallists, Cole Hocker, Josh Kerr, and Yared Nuguse, was your winner, but rather Olympic 800m champ Emmanuel Wanyonyi. It also produced this iconic photo:
Emmanuel Wanyonyi wins Grand Slam Kingston 1500m over Yared Nuguse (Kevin Morris photo)
…and some matchups that didn’t
Some of the races were duds, or if I’m being generous, very different from what I’m used to seeing. In the women’s long distance event group (3000 and 5000 meters) Ejgayehu Taye and Agnes Ngetich destroyed the field, finishing 9+ seconds ahead of everyone else in the 3000 and 24+ seconds ahead in the 5000. At least in the 5000 they were battling to see who took home $100,000 with second getting $50,000. The financial stakes were serious — a $50,000 difference between 1st and 2nd compared to just a $4,000 difference in the Diamond League.
In the men’s 3000, Grant Fisher was content to race for 3rd place, knowing that would secure him the event group win and the $100,000. As viewers in the comments of our live Grand Slam recap podcast (video here, audio here) pointed out, stuff like that happens in stages of the Tour de France all the time. But is this what the sport wants long-term?
The fans watched Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone run in essence a (very windy) time trial in the flat 400m against the 400m hurdlers instead of watching her race Paulino, Naser, and Thomas in the flat 400. The fans want to see the best race the best.
The happiest guy of the weekend may have France’s Sasha Zhoya. After running 10.55 for 100m — granted into a massive headwind — he ran across the track with his arms outstretched before dancing in front of the crowd and invading Michael Johnson’s trackside box to thank him for the prize money.
Sasha Zhoya starts his celebration at Grand Slam Track (Kevin Morris photo)
No, he was not trying to do a Florence Griffith-Joyner impersonation, although he did run slower than her world record of 10.49. He had won the 100m and in conjunction with his 2nd place in 110m hurdles, picked up the biggest payday of his life by winning the 110m/100m event. Very cool to see his excitement, which showed this clearly meant something to him, but it also showed how the GST format devalues the primary event of the 110m hurdles. Walmart worker Dylan Beard might have had the same reaction as Zhoya after he won the 110m hurdles on Saturday if that had netted him $100,000. Instead, he had to come back the next day and run the 100 to figure out how much prize money he would take home.
The 800m matchup between Olympic gold and silver medalists Emmanuel Wanyonyi and Marco Arop lost a little of its luster after Wanyonyi won the 1500 portion of the 800/1500 event group on Saturday. Because he was 1st and Arop only 6th in that race, Wanyonyi was pretty much assured the $100,000 unless he completely bombed the 800. So while Arop convincingly won the 800, it was a bit overlooked as Wanyonyi was being celebrated as the Slam winner.
What’s wrong with having just a few athletes double and some field events?
The growth mindset
While Grand Slam Track was securing broadcast deals for hundreds of countries and trying to make the meet as widely available in the United States as possible, the Diamond League has abandoned that growth mindset — at least in the United States. Just one Diamond League meet will be available on TV in the United States this year, the Prefontaine Classic. The rest of the meets will be only available for hardcore fans on FloTrack. Specialty streamers like FloTrack are a necessary pipeline for niche sports fans, but going with FloTrack is all about extracting value from the sport, not trying to grow it. Just ask Major League Soccer.
With the Los Angeles Olympics three years away, there is a huge opportunity to grow the visibility of track & field in America. Grand Slam Track is trying to do that, as is Athlos, which streamed its meet for free on the internet and had a highlights package on ESPN2. The Diamond League does not seem interested.
The bad: the crowd (or lack thereof)
Heading into Kingston, we wondered if Grand Slam Track had some magic formula that no one else had figured out. Apart from the Prefontaine Classic and the Olympic Trials, no one else in America can get more than 5,000 fans to attend a professional track meet. The bar is very low. Granted this meet was not in America, but it was being held in cavernous National Stadium and over three days.
Would big crowds come out each day? The answer was a resounding no. The Day 1 attendance (no official figures were announced) was as low as one could possibly imagine.
The “crowd” on Day 1 — this shot was taken just after the first GST race of the day
If you had said when GST was announced they’d have over $3 million in prize money at meet #1 and launch in Jamaica, I wouldn’t have believed they would have as few fans as they did. But also if you said they wouldn’t have any of Noah Lyles, Sha’Carri Richardson, Kishane Thompson, Shericka Jackson, or Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, I wouldn’t have believed you either. (Thompson and Jackson actually left Jamaica to compete at the Miramar Invitational outside of Miami last weekend instead).
But that is what happened. Both Athlos (here) and the Diamond League (here) took subtle digs at the lack of a crowd in Jamaica, but the (low) bar has now been established. Things can only improve for GST going forward, and they showed by giving away free tickets on Saturday and Sunday (though there were still many empty seats, particularly on Sunday) that they are willing to learn.
The next meet is in Miami (Miramar), in a much smaller facility that seats only 5,000. By default the visuals will be much better, and “packing the house” like Athlos did (it wasn’t a packed house) shouldn’t be that difficult, especially if they add a big sprint star or two. What will Athlos be tweeting out then?
For meet #3 in Philadelphia, GST needs to spend tens of thousands of dollars and tarp off vast sections of Franklin Field (or, better yet, get a sponsor to pay for it in exchange for their logo on the tarp). The stadium seats 52,000 and it’s not going to look good on TV when the vast majority of those seats are empty.
We’ve heard through the grapevine to expect big things for the fourth and final GST meet in LA. It’s the week before the Prefontaine Classic, so many of the top European athletes will be heading over to the US anyway. Get them at the meet, fill the stands, and also have a few celebrities in attendance. Ask Athlos founder Alexis Ohanian, who lives in LA, how it’s done.
The format
Requiring athletes to double is at the core of Grand Slam Track, and, perhaps not coincidentally, the history of its founder Michael Johnson. But it’s clear a number of top athletes and their coaches are against the idea. Femke Bol competes as much as any top sprinter on the circuit, but even her coach Laurent Meuwly said he did not like the idea of running 400/400 hurdle doubles this early in the season.
Noah Lyles and Sha’Carri Richardson presumably can get six figures for showing up at a Diamond League and only running one race, so if you want them to run two, it’s going to cost you even more money. Plus there is a higher risk of injury and preparation concerns for the meets that really matter later in the year (national championships and Worlds). Olympic 400 hurdles champion Rai Benjamin said as much on the Beyond the Records podcast in March.
“If you want me to come out and run 44-low [in the 400] and then come back the next day and run 46-47 [in the 400 hurdles], bro, what am I gonna do for the rest of the week?” Benjamin said. “You never know what might happen. I might run 44 today and be sore tomorrow. And now I’ve gotta go hurdle and now I’m at risk of getting hurt in April.”
Or consider the case of Kishane Thompson. He’s the Olympic 100m silver medalist and one of the sport’s brightest young stars, but he has a history of injuries and is not good at the 200. What’s wrong with having him only running the 100 at a Grand Slam meet?
Doubling does create more races and a bigger TV window over three days, which in theory is a more valuable product to sell to broadcasters. But doubling also makes the series a harder sell for certain athletes. And it’s also a lot to ask from track fans for them to tune into three three-hour broadcast windows over the course of a weekend.
2026 is pivotal
Grand Slam Track’s goal should now be to make it to season 2 in 2026. What happens in 2026? For the first time in six years, there won’t be a World Championship or Olympics. Which means money talks even more.
Maybe a handful of track stars can make more by getting a huge appearance fee from a Diamond League meet, but for the rest Grand Slam is where it is at financially. If doubling is preventing some athletes from competing this year, even if Grand Slam doesn’t abandon that requirement, that concern goes down noticeably in 2026. Grand Slam Track will also have a year under its belt to address problem areas.
That said, 2026 will feature the inaugural World Athletics Ultimate Championships at the end of the season—a three-day, $10 million showdown that’s like GST on steroids, with each session packed into three hours. Still, the opportunity is still there for GST to carve out its own lane throughout the season. And it remains to be seen whether athletes will prioritize the Ultimate Champs in the same way as Worlds or the Olympics.
In 2026, GST could try to expand into other countries or they can be more ambitious with their schedule and invade more into the Diamond League season. This year, the GST schedule is very front-loaded. Not sure if they wanted to establish themselves in what is traditionally a dead period for the Diamond League, they knew athletes wouldn’t want to double as championship season approached, or if World Athletics cautioned them to play nice. But with no Worlds in 2026, Grand Slam Track’s dollars will be even more appealing as athletes won’t have to worry about it compromising their chances for Worlds.
The future
As the 2028 Olympics approach, track & field is at a crossroads. Short-term, no one else can compete with GST’s prize money. GST offers $12.6 million total and $3.15 million per meet; the Diamond League’s $500,000 per meet ($9.24 million total) suddenly looks very small. Granted, that is not the only money the DL pays out to athletes — its total athlete compensation, including appearance fees, is a self-reported $18 million — but Grand Slam Track’s $12.6 million doesn’t include appearance fees or Racer contracts.
But GST also has a questionable format, three days to fill, no history, and the forced necessity to innovate quickly.
The Diamond League has its history, fans, field events, and ability to attract athletes behind the scenes strategically with appearance fees (while paying the 8th-place lane-filler a lot less, which is smart strategically). But it has shown no collective ability to push the sport forward. It is a collection of individual meets, most of which are the big fish in their own countries. Will GST inspire them to greater things?
Athlos and founder Alexis Ohanian have the production, access to non-track brands, and celebrity connections others in the sport wish they could emulate. Putting on a one-day meet with six events for one sex is also financially much more manageable ($663,000 in prize money). But right now, it is one meet on one day at the very end of the season, which makes it almost impossible to be a transformational entity in the sport.
While GST, Athlos, and the Diamond League were all patting themselves on the back this weekend, the biggest winners were the athletes, who are going to walk away with a lot more money in 2025. But for the money grab to be permanent, GST needs to improve on its start, the Diamond League must change its mindset, and Athlos must try to scale. Track and field’s future hinges on who adapts best—because right now, clearly no one’s got it all figured out.
