HERE’S THIS MONTH’S collection of short takes on generally off-track activities that have gone/will go a long way towards shaping the way the sport is headed.
More DL Prize Money Next Year
The world’s top performers will have the opportunity to win more Wanda Diamond League cash starting in ’25. The total outlay will be $9.24M.
Including promotional fees for top athletes, a total of around $18M will be paid over the course of the season, with “many more millions being invested in athlete services such as travel and transport, accommodation and medical and physio provision.”
At each of next year’s 14 DL meetings the total prize money on offer is $500,000, with the DL Final upping the ante to $2.24M.
“The Wanda Diamond League remains committed to rewarding the athletes more, whilst at the same time ensuring the long term sustainability of the series, so it continues to provide vital competition to the athletes for many more years to come,” said Petr Stastny, the DL’s CEO in announcing the new structure.
Syd In, Out, “In” DL Final
Organizers of this year’s Van Damme Memorial appeared to have added a big draw when they announced that superstar Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone would be added to the DL Final in both the 200 and 400 as a wild card.
Not so fast, countered Diamond League bosses, ruling that she hadn’t run in a DL race all year and didn’t meet any of the criteria for special treatment.
Said Peter Stastny, “It is not about allowing a specific athlete to compete or not. It is about rules and criteria which must be fulfilled by all to becoming eligible to compete at the DL Final. Ms. McLaughlin-Levrone does not fulfill those criteria, either by accumulating enough points or receiving a wild card. The final leg of the Diamond League is not an invitational meeting, and any athlete proposed for a Global Wild Card must have competed at least in one of our events during this season.”
SML ended up running special sections of both long dashes, winning both. Her 22.40 was faster than all but the winner (22.20) in the 200, and her 49.11 in the 400 was the fastest time of the weekend.
Why No Holloway In Brussels?
In a sport where its stars are all too frequently hard to pin down for competition, straightaway hurdlers have a great rep for being willing to compete just about anywhere, anytime. It was a surprise, then, when the DL Final didn’t include 110H world champ Grant Holloway. The explanation was simple.
He posted to his X account, “I will not be participating in the Brussels Diamond League Final due to failure to reach agreements on the terms of my participation between my team and the meeting directors of the Diamond League. Shame that they doing athletes like that.”
Among his tag lines was #NeverCompeteforLess.
A Busy Testing Year For The ITA
The International Testing Agency (ITA) has announced that more than 88% of all Olympic athletes were tested at least once since the beginning of the year. That amounted to over 32,600 individual tests, which was a 45% increase over the previous 6 months.
In what the ITA identified as “high-risk” disciplines, more than 75% of athletes were tested three times or more and testers got to 95% at least once. The number represent an increase from the previous Games.
The Agency also says that it tested about a third of Paris Olympians, a number 4% higher than Tokyo and 10% higher than Rio. Only 5 athletes tested positive, one of them from track & field, a 10.48 sprinter from Congo.
“These numbers underline the motivation and willingness of anti-doping organizations across the globe to contribute to the common goal of fair play at the Olympic Games,” read the ITA release.
A Potential Big Headache For LA
The biggest threat to the LA Olympics may not be doping or climate change. Instead, some experts are saying the U.S. government’s delays in processing tourist visas might leave plenty of open seats in the Coliseum. For visitors from some countries, the wait at this point can be nearly 2 years.
A bipartisan group of U.S. senators has sent a letter to President Biden urging him to set up a task force on global sporting events to address the problem. In addition to the ’28 Games, the ’26 World Cup may be affected, along with the ‘31 Rugby World Cup and the ’34 Winter Olympics. The soccer World Cup, for instance, is expected to bring more than 5 million international visitors to the U.S.
“To ensure the success of these events, preparations must be made to facilitate smooth and secure travel to the United States for our international guests,” read the letter. “One challenge that must be an immediate and top priority is streamlining interview wait times for visitor visas.”
“We’ve got to roll out the welcome mat… We’ve got to make it clear that we want these travelers to come,” said Geoff Freeman, head of the U.S. Travel Association.
A 5-Year Collegiate Career?
With all the earthshaking changes coming to NCAA programs, why not a few more?
Reportedly among the measures being discussed in relation to the coming settlement of three major legal cases (often called the House settlement after one of the cases, House v. NCAA), is that the National Letter of Intent will be eliminated, a 5th year of eligibility will be allowed, and athletes might be permitted to win prize money before college.
The proposed changes may come out of the coming review of all of the NCAA’s athlete eligibility rules to bring them in line with the terms of the settlement. The fifth-year provision, for instance, may reflect the current rule in NCAA football, which allows an athlete to play a certain percentage of contests (about 30%) during a redshirt year.
More reporting will certainly follow on this complex issue, as the NCAA scholarship changes that have been proposed — another ramification of the House settlement — may risk the Olympic development pipeline for the U.S. and other countries as well.
Experimental “Track Lab” Meet
Urged on by Seb Coe and WA to experiment with new ways of contesting our sport, the organizers of a meet in Switzerland’s Fribourg did just that. Track Lab on September 01 was a Continental Tour Silver meet with a twist.
For one, a mile steeplechase was held, won by Ethiopian Abraham Seme in 4:14.36. Sprinters got to operate with no false-start rules.
The vault was a mixed-sex competition and the absolute effective height of each jump was measured using a laser. The long jump used the controversial 40cm takeoff zone, with attempts measured from point of launch. And in the javelin, only best marks and improvements were measured.
Fans also got to watch a team race play out, and the at-home crowd could watch the stream shot by drones. Was it a success? The jury may be out for now. Few big marks resulted (women’s long jump, 21-9½ 6.64, for instance), but Dutch hurdler Nadine Visser was among those who must have loved it, as she captained the winning team that shared a $22,000 prize. ◻︎