Virtual Track Meets
by Savannah Cress
Today concludes the first week back to (virtual) school where I live, in Raleigh, NC. And let me tell you, it was every bit as much fun as I remembered from last spring. I do think it will get smoother though, once the kids readjust to the concept of school in general. With having the summer to better prepare for virtual execution, our school system has a much more routine-oriented plan for this fall than we did for the unexpected virtual school of spring. Education is not the only area of life that has gotten some decent COVID-friendly plans in place recently. I guess that’s what happens when a drastic societal change lasts for months with no clear end in sight. To our credit, humans are rather adaptable when forced to be.
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Over the Summer we began to see track meets re-emerge, adapting to the coronavirus’ presence. Though they look much different from the meets held in pre-virus days, it is good to see competitive opportunities cropping up again.
One such opportunity, held near Greenville, SC, was more of a friendly competitive pole-vaulting practice, complete with 150-ish socially-distant spectators. When US Olympic pole vaulter, Sandi Morris, like so many other athletes, lost access to her training facility with the onset of COVID-19, she took it a few steps up from lifting weights with soup-cans. Sandi and her former-decathlete father, Harry Morris, decided to build their own world-class pole vaulting facility. The 120-foot runway and landing pit were constructed next to the tennis courts in Sandi’s parents’ neighborhood just outside of Greenville. This new facility was the site of the U.S. Track & Field-approved pole vaulting competition, held July 15th, that included 9 Olympic hopefuls and was televised on ESPN’s YouTube channel. The 150 spectators were residents of the Morrises’ neighborhood and the competition came to be known as The Acadia Invitational, after the community in which it was held.
One of the neat things about the Acadia meet was the logistical orchestration of this event. As one of the first events to include spectators after the postponement of the 2020 Olympics was announced, the Morrises did a pretty impressive job of organizing a live, socially-distant sporting event full of positive, competitive energy. There were designated entrances with temperature check points, orange traffic barricades clearly marking many areas from which fans could watch and cheer, each spaced 12 feet apart from the next. The limited number of spectators allowed for appropriate social distancing between household groups, and masks were required. Each athlete had a small tent area to base from while waiting to jump, as well as her own landing pad. From the just-as-important morale side of things, the event had a DJ, an enthusiastic announcer to introduce the athletes and hype up the crowd, and energy from cheering fans to fuel competitive spirits – so well in fact, that Morris and one of her friendly competitors, Katie Nageotte, both cleared the bar at 4.86m, topping the world record height of 4.81m. [1] [2] [3]
A few days after the Arcadia Invitational, some other world record times were topped at a meet in Fort Worth, Texas. At the AP Ranch High Performance Invitationals, Michael Norman ran the 100m sprint for the first time in 4 years, running it in a world-leading 9.86s and becoming just the 2nd person in history to achieve sub-10s for the 100m, sub-20s for the 200m and sub-44s for the 400m race. Hurdle ladies Brianna Rollins-McNeil, Keni Harrison and Daliliah Muhammad could also be found competing here on July 20th, though not in the hurdles. The three did occupy places 1 – 3 respectively in the finals of the 150m dash, with Brianna setting a new PR and breaking a 30-year world record time for the event. She may not have had a chance to defend her 100h Olympic title this summer, but hey, breaking world record sprint times has got to be a close second, right?
To combat potential spread of COVID, participants in the AP Ranch HP Invitationals were divided into small “sections” for every event, ensuring each athlete an empty lane on both sides during races. The event was divided up in other, interestingly creative ways as well, to combat potential use of reduction clauses in athletes’ sponsorship contracts. The “s” on the end of “Invitationals” is not a typo. Many professional athletes must meet minimum exposure numbers required by sponsors in terms of how many meets they participate in each year to keep their sponsorship. With so many meets cancelled and the Olympics postponed to another calendar year, many athletes could find themselves at risk of significant pay reductions due to not appearing in (for example, in the case of many Nike athletes) 10 meets this season. Conveniently, the AP Ranch High Performance Invitational was divided into 10 separate official meets taking place on 2 different days. On July 20th, the “AP Ranch HP Invitational #1” consisted of the long jump and 60 meter race. The “AP Ranch HP Invitational #2” contained just one event, the 100 meter sprint. The “AP Ranch HP Invitational #3” consisted also one just one event, the 150m dash, while meets numbers 4 and 5 contained the 250m and 300m dashes respectively. Two days later, on July 23, 2020, the AP Ranch HP Invitationals #6 – #10 occurred, with Long Jump, 60m, 100m,200m, 300m and 400m races divided up similarly. This setup allowed athletes to potentially knock out 10 competitions in a matter of days. Consequently, we got athletes competing in events they do not compete in on a regular basis to make sure they fulfilled appearance requirements just in case sponsors were to decide to enforce those reduction clauses. While not an ideal competition schedule in general, it proved to have interesting moments, in addition to the mundane, and some impressive, unexpected times resulted. [4] [5] [13] [14]
On a global scale, yesterday marked the official beginning of the 2020 Diamond League season. The Wanda Diamond League meet, held in Monaco, hosted a much smaller crowd of spectators than usual, capping attendance at 5000, as a safety precaution. With many of the Diamond League meets cancelled, the league has restructured the 2020 season. There will not be a series of meets leading to a final event as is usually the case. The final meet scheduled for Zurich has been cancelled. While some competitions will go on as scheduled, or with modified schedules, athletes will not earn Diamond League points. And the “Diamond Race,” the winner of which is generally determined by the number of points accumulated in each discipline throughout the League season, will not be occurring in the 2020 season.
Monaco Meeting Director, Jean Pierre Schoebel, and his organizing team took many precautions to ensure a safe event in Monaco. Much of the way the meet is run was restructured: from the athletes’ travel accommodations to the physical staging of the competitions. “We’ve never worked as hard as this year,” Schoebel said of the logistical reorganization. [12] All athletes were required to be tested for COVID-19 prior to traveling to Monaco and again upon their arrival before being cleared to compete. They changed the hotel used to accommodate the competitors to one located across the street from the meet venue so involved parties would not need to interface with transportation between the hotel and the track, lessening exposure opportunities. Spectators were seated in every other row and had to wear masks. They were permitted to bring bottled water, as concession stands were not operating at the event. Acknowledging that there are still risks associated with putting on an event this size during a global virus pandemic, Schobel feels that the organization committee did everything they could to minimize those risks, and that the additional planning involved to do so was well worth it. “We are making a big effort as we know the athletes want to get back into competition, and I hope we will succeed.” [12] [6] [9] [10] [11]
On the more precautionary end of the spectrum, USATF hosted a 2020 Youth Virtual Summer Challenge in July. The event drew over 700 participants ages 7 – 18 from over 100 track clubs. While the event line-up had a disappointing void of all things hurdle-related, it was a neat way to bring a competitive opportunity to hundreds of young athletes who have endured a non-existent spring season with the onset of the coronavirus. This competition was completely virtual. Participants took video of their event performance at a track of their choice, and uploaded those videos through the AthleticNET app, where they were reviewed, verified and then posted on Athletic.net. Athletes could then view their placement and share results through social media if they elected to do so. All-in-all, a fun event for youth who are competitively-motivated that required zero risk of physical contact. [7] [8]
From socially-distant, in-person meets to entirely-virtual competitions, and every stage of hybrid meet in between, the track world has done a decent job of keeping the competitive spirit alive and offering motivating opportunities to athletes during this less-than-ideal time. While not all of us have the resources to go out and build ourselves a world-class track (or tennis court, or dance studio, or hockey rink..) in our backyards, we appear to be on our way to re-establishing a current “normalcy” and finding creative outlets through which to maintain sports-related activity and keep the competitive streak alive. That still doesn’t entirely erase the feeling I get in the pit of my stomach after making a wistful comment about when we are back to school and life “pre-coronavirus-style” and the person with whom I am speaking looks a me and says “I don’t think we ever will be entirely. At least part-virtual is the way of the future!” My personal “adaptability” has yet to reach a point where I’m okay with that.
References:
[4]https://www.worldathletics.org/news/report/michael-norman-986-100m
[5]https://trackalerts.com/norman-enters-sprint-history-in-9-86s/
[6]https://www.usatf.org/news/2020/americans-shine-bright-in-first-official-diamond-l
[7]https://www.usatf.org/news/2020/usatf-youth-virtual-summer-challenge
[8]https://www.usatf.org/news/2020/usatf-launches-2020-youth-virtual-summer-challenge
[10]https://www.diamondleague.com/calendar/
[12]https://www.worldathletics.org/news/news/turku-and-monaco-coronavirus-precautions
[14]http://ntxtiming.com/Track_Meets/2020/ap_ranch_day_1_2020/eventPages/150Dash.html
[15]http://ntxtiming.com/results.html
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