The Diamond League will be useless to an American audience due to Flo Track. Few people will pay exorbitant prices for poor coverage. Flo track is the worst thing to happen to American track ever probably. Absolutely ridiculous.
Useless may be a strong word, but I definitely hear you. The more subscriptions we have to pay for, the more complex it becomes to be able to be able to watch the sport we love. In a perfect world, we could just watch everything for free on RUclips, but I also understand and acknowledge that meets need to not only expand viewership but also make money and streaming for free it not always a smart financial move, which leads to subscriptions and increased prices. I will say to be fair that people still had to pay for Peacock to watch the Diamond league in previous years, now the price may have been different, but its a subscription. Its a tricky world when it comes to watching Track & Field
Yeah, Flotrack did GST a good turn by buying the American rights to the Diamond League, assuming GST is going to be on a platform where you don't have to pay through the nose.
For a T/F fanatic .. I love it 🎉 there’s gonna be complications for sure but overall ( personally speaking ) the more meets the better. I hope they’ll be televised or easy to stream 🤞🏾 Absolutely love your coverage 🤝🏾
Thanks for watching! Yea, for fans this will be great since we can watch so much track all year round. Now streaming is a whole other question since so many meets means we have to go around to different places to watch. But well see how this works out!
Hey Anderson let me take this moment to commend you for the good job you are doing, very unbiased track and field news/highlights letting us fans be on know on what's happening or gonna happen. On this accept my gratitude and keep it up.
Really do appreciate that bro! We all definitely have bias and preference, but I definitely try to keep things as balanced as possible while giving my honest opinion. Thanks as always for watching!💯
Using the world relays to qualify for the world championship is the biggest problem especially for smaller countries who doesn't have the depth to send other athletes to replace the ones who are either in college or just injured or not in shape in May to qualify for WC
Yea its a big problem. I do understand the idea of qualifying your relays to get into the world championships, but the problem is because of how the sport is structured, a country's relay team don't always train together and each individual athlete schedules their season differently. And like you said, athletes may be college or other factors may arise. But a big issue is the location with it being out in China which is far for the majority of the nations who are competing for relay spots.
Agreed. Its great that we'll get to watch so much more track, but it will be a balance for athletes to manage everything next year. I think they best of the best will be able focus on the World championships and work backwards from there for the most part.
Thanks Anderson for the thorough insight. It’ll be interesting to see where the dominoes fall this year. Overall, I see the diamond league taking the biggest hit - makes me wonder the impact on ROI for the likely most impacted cities that invested in those beautiful track stadiums. Funny that your thumbnail pits MJ vs Coe - what are you really trying to say? lol
Thanks for watching! Yea I suspect the Diamond League might take the biggest hit in terms of quality, but not sure yet because many of those diamond league meets (Lausanne, Zurich, Monaco, Brussels, etc. are historical legacy meets. They will always be staples on the calendar and because Europe is always enthusiastic about track, they will get attendance. But the quality of the fields may likely be diminished relative to previous years. Hahahaha I actually created 3 thumbnails are rotating now, but yea the main one is MJ next to Coe. I mean GST is the new venture, Diamond League is the existing World Athletics venture, just an interesting comparison with the "faces" of both, but no harm meant!
In regards to the athletes specifically, this upcoming season is going to display/expose who can manage their season well and peak accordingly for the World Championships at the end of the year. There have been some athletes who race/jump/throw/compete all year round from indoor to outdoor and manage to successfully get on the podium at the Outdoor Championships with no major setbacks (Femkie Bol, Noah Lyles, Ryan Crouser, Mondo Duplantis etc). Then there are other athletes who have successful indoor seasons but can't seem to replicate this success Outdoors. As well as that, you have athletes who don't compete indoors at all, wait to the outdoor season, and either have a great season from nationals to Worlds/Olympics, etc, or a problematic one or an inconsistent one. The athletes who are able to manage a balanced calendar as well as handle the travelling, the conditions at each event and not have major injury or fatigue issues, will be able to succeed at the Worlds in Japan in September. It's not enough to run fast times/throw or jump big distances at nationals and wait it out until the Worlds a month later. The schedule difference doesn't give most athletes the comfort like it used to before. So not only is it going to expose the best athletes from the pack, but it will display the methods coaches use for their athletes and if it is sustainable and helpful long term. I do think some athletes are going to under/overcompete from this.
This is a great point, athletes and coaches will really have to lock in an ensure they are able to make appropriate decisions to manage the season well. World Indoors, World Relays, World Championships. The best of the best athletes will likely be fine, especially athletes who have wild cards to Worlds (Noah, Femke, Mondo, Sha'Carri, Paulino, etc.). But for everyone else the decisions they make will be key to success, especially if they decide to do Indoors this year. Could we see more athletes skip indoors and instead focus on running outdoors with the goal being worlds? How will NCAA athletes manage? Will be interesting to see how things play out!
Excellent analysis for any of the couch potatoes around the globe, especially those of us on the outer limits! Tony Hunt World Junior Athletics News NZL.
@@k.o6157 Perhaps more diluted line-ups on each competition? There will be more competitions, but less talents in each, as athletes will not compete in more competitions than on last season, to prevent injuries.
@@TobyGuyana Exactly, but since coaches know how many competitions their athletes are capable of participating with minimum injury risk, the more probable outcome will be less talents in each competition.
Yea that will be good to keep interest in the sport year after year. The off year would sometimes be a down time, but it will be interesting to see how athletes manage the year after year competitions. But as you say, other sports have championships every year so it makes sense for us to do the same in some way.
Jamaica usually schedules it's national track and field championships the same time as the US does, so I don't think there will be a conflict with Grand Slam Track.
I hope that ends up being the case. Jamaica released it's 2025 calendar already and national championships is on the 26th-29th which is why I included it in the video. Hopefully they plan to move it to a different date and maybe it was just oversight on their end in terms of scheduling.
@@TheFinalLegIt would be wild for Jamaica to have their championship so far ahead of the actual Worlds. I also think GST doesnt choose that week unless they knew it would be free of Champs. They don't mind fighting with the DL and Continental Tour but country champs is something different, especially during a Worlds year. Just puts up a barrier when they are trying to get the fastest and best racers.
Thanks for addressing this. The existence of GST might mean we don't see as many races during the season where the top ranked Europeans and Americans compete against one another, which would be ironic (because GST was meant to put all the top names in one event) and sad for fans who want to see these match ups. I can see Jamaica having issues again with world relays because the same team was just voted back in at JAAA. With regard Oceania athletes, Australia has its major outdoor meets from January and nationals in early April, from memory NZ nationals is early in the calendar too. Many athletes then go to Europe for DL and WA continental tour meets, because selection is done early athletes will know well in advance if they have to return for Tokyo WC so this should not be an issue for them. Finding where meets stream is always a nightmare for track fans but I'm old enough to remember when there was no livestream to look for so I'm just grateful for what we have.
Yea there wont be as my top Europeans vs Americans (ie Femke vs Sydney, Karsten vs Rai & Alison if Rai signs up). I think the problem is that though GST wants to bring the top athletes together, our sport is just way to global to accomodate all the top athletes in one location without allowing for them to be spread out amongst other competitions. Your right that Jamaica will have to figure things out with the relays next year because they are very much at risk of not qualifying again if they are not careful. Thanks for the call out on Oceania + Australian athletes here. Will someone like Jessica Hull have issues when it comes to Nationals? I didn't check that.
@@TheFinalLeg I can't speak for NZ but Australian selectors have some lee way. At the moment there are four Australian women with the WC qualifying standard for the 1500m, and the top two at Nationals are guaranteed to go through. But if Jess Hull doesn't make Nationals she holds the AR and has a Silver medal from the OG which I would think almost certainly means she's selected. If you look at the selection process for the OG national record holders and athletes on the podium at WC were the first selected - Nina Kennedy, Patterson and Olyslagers, Matt Denny and Jess herself. The only way this could become an issue is if they insist she races at Nationals because another athlete has the qualifying standard. Even then I think she has time to return from Jamaica in time to compete or GST doesn't expect her to compete in that meet. I know she was in discussions with GST for a long time before signing and I'm guessing her attendance at Australian nationals must've been part of the conversation. This is all guesswork as neither Jess nor the selectors have said anything yet but I can't see her not being selected for WC.
Great analysis of the upcoming athletics schedule. Another issue with Grand Slam Track is that it’s too US based to be compared with the Tennis Grand Slams (Which has Grand Slams spread across the world) the way MJ likes to. 3 of the 4 Slams are US based which gives the Athletes based there a great advantage. I can’t believe they couldnt secure at least one European location (or somewhere else in the world) for an event to even out the playing field a little and encourage more top non US athletes to sign up and compete.
There's something odd to me about isolating an entire group of athletes to compete in a very specific league, and then to essentially leave the rest of the field (DL racers) to race later in the year before championships. Not that there won't be *some* crossover ( idk honestly), but given the average athlete is barely even racing 8 times in a single season to begin with (most aren't tbh), I just don't understand why Grand Slam feels the need to effectively monopolize a certain group of athletes so that we'll almost never see them in another racing format again. It sucks because I love the concept of a new track league coming to the scene and forcing things like the DL, FloTrack, and others to get their act together and put some care into the sport, but I think MJ's approach is really confusing, a bit gimmicky, and perhaps way too optimistic with the way he touts it as the "savior" of the sport when most of the meets are during the least exciting part of the season lol. There's a lot more I could say and have written down elsewhere, but I'm just... really confused is all lol.
Interesting, curious what you mean by isolation? Its a league so signing them makes sense to ensure they compete in their specific meets and they are still allowed to compete in the Diamond league, Continental tour, other meets, if they chose. But your correct that most athletes dont compete as frequently as you would expect (top athletes in 2024 sprints/hurdles in 2024 raced about 15+ times a year including rounds at trials/Olympics). I think one thing to keep in mind is how track is currently structured. Its basically a free for all where athletes do whatever they want however they want. They could race in the USA, then be in London, then Hungary, then Kenya, back in the USA etc. Its cool to see them around, but its also not structured in any way for us to follow athletes week to week or for us to understand what each meet means. Thats not to say GST meets mean anything yet (each meet is an individual Slam with no connection to the previous one) but there at least is structure around the idea that fans will see their athletes compete at a specific place a few times though the year. No one is guaranteed to show up to a diamond League or even USA Champs if they have a wild card to worlds (see: Grant Holloway every other year). In general, we do get to see the best athletes compete, but from the viewer perspective its not great knowing you paid $X for a stream and your favorite athlete pulled out for no clear reason. I dont ever thing Track will become like NBA, NFL, MLB etc, BUT I do think Michael Johnson sees there is some structure in these other sports than can be applied to track and he's starting with GST. Its not perfect and may not even work as expected next year, but I think its a move in the right direction towards something that could be slightly better than what exists. Thanks for watching!
@@TheFinalLeg GST athletes are allowed to compete in other leagues, but the EV of competing in other races outside of GST becomes substantially lower if you're contractually signed to the league. After GST has run its course for the year, why would anyone even bother to race at any DL/Continental Tour after 8 races under their belt, after they've made more money than they ever had through the DL, especially with their national and world championships to worry about? The DL money sucks, the competition level is inconsistent, and some just don't wanna travel to Europe unless they absolutely have to lol. It's just -EV in the end unless you *really* love competing that much. I haven't checked every single athlete, but outside of hurdles (and a few sprinters), they're just not in more than 8 finals throughout an entire year, let alone jamming 8 of them within the first couple months of the season and *then* expecting a conventional DL circuit where they'll be running some fast TT's too? It would be an absolute treat for the fans, don't get me wrong, but idk it doesn't seem realistic for a majority of the disciplines. It also doesn't help that I despise the double-event gimmick of GST to begin with, but that's another discussion for another time lol.
@@RunnerBoi I hear you for sure and I think I do agree that most athletes will make more money than ever in GST so won't be inclined to run much after. I don't keep as close an eye on the distance athletes so not sure about their frequency but your probably right. I think short hurdlers are the only ones who will compete frequently after, along with some sprinters. The one thing to keep in mind is that Track & Field doesn't have any current Leagues. The Diamond League is a glorified collection of invitational meets. Same with American Track League, Continental tour, etc. That's why athletes can compete outside of GST. But yea I don't disagree with being skeptical about things since it's (technically) never been done before in this formal (see the ITA from the 70s). On a baseline I'm optimistic for 2025 since it's the early part of the season and I like the names who have signed up so far. But will see how things actually play out.
Sydney ran pretty frequently this year relative to previous years and relative to other top athletes (check the recent video I did on it) Now we will see her run 2 times at 4 meets for sure next year. On top of that, she will run USAs and Worlds. I know that she likely wont be in the Diamond League, but theres tons of athletes who generally only compete in Europe and dont come to the USA. So its all a balance. No idea about Mu since she was injured last year.
As a track fan it is good to have this many choices for athletes. As an American the sad thing is the poor coverage…but hey why would the IAAF care about American fans when USATF doesn’t care.
The coverage is very tough when theres so many streaming services, subscriptions, TV channels for various meets in different countries around the world, etc. But we'll see how things play out next year and hopefully things are as accessible as possible for fans
Jamaica putting their Nationals back seems like a sensible option, although what would seem even more sensible is if these diffierent bodies/organisations actually communicated with each other, so scheduling conflicts could be reduced. I realise, to some extent, Gland Slam and Wanda are competitors, but they both want the same thing, which is to attract more fans to athletics, so it makes sense for them to work together to achieve this goal. That said, I don't really see Grand Slam/Diamond League conflicts as much of an issue, given that athletes don't compete in every DL event anyway. You could view this as athletes having more choice of when and where to compete. Season length is an issue, but that's always the case with late Globals. Seb Coe has said that he ideally wants the Globals to be the final event of the season, but obviously that's not always the best option when they are being held in places like Northern Europe where the weather is already in decline by that time. I doubt too many athletes/coaches will have too much of a hard time with scheduling. They will decide their priorities early in the season. If they want to compete at Globals, they will have to compete at Nationals or whatever the qualifying event is. They will obviously change their personal schedules throughout the season, depending on how things are going at the time, but that happens every season anyway. The thing I'm not sure about is the Gland Slam contracts. From what I've seen, it seems like the athletes are contracted to compete at every event, so if there is a conflict, particularly like Jamaican Nationals, they have to choose whether or not to honour their contract. That could potentially result in top athletes missing Globals, which doesn't seem like a good way to bring more people to the sport. Maybe there has been communication in this regard between MJ and World Athletics. It was already a great time to be a track fan, now we get even more. Sounds good to me, assuming it doesn't cause issues.
I think Michael has spoken with World Athletics and they did attempt to reduce the scheduling conflicts as much as possible. At a base line, the only conflict between GST and Diamond League is the Shanghai meet in May. But outside of that, GST kept things early in the year and not going into July or August which would have made it more complicated. As you said, most athletes dont run every diamond league race anyway, and based on the schedule, they can run GST, then in July/August run a bunch of diamond leagues. The bigger issue, as we both note, is the length of the track season. Because worlds is late in the year AND there is world indoors and world relays in early may, athletes will have to make some serious decisions on how they will plan out their years and if they will even decide to run indoors. The top athletes should have too many issues, but it will be the athletes who are on the cusp of making a team or getting on the podium who will have to be very strategic about the year. Regarding GST contracts and conflicts, I wouldn't be surprised if they simply allow athletes to compete at National championships, or if Jamaica moves their national champs to July/august closer to worlds. June is very early so we'll see what happens. Appreciate the comment!
@@TheFinalLeg I don't think many athletes will be too concerned about World Indoors making the season even longer. There have always been athletes that like to compete indoors and those that don't. The ones that do always have a longer season as a result, but many of them still do well even at the end of the outdoor season. We always have a good idea of who will and won't compete, although there are sometimes surprises, but, for example, it's a fairly safe bet that Femke will be at World Indoors and Sydney won't. I feel more sorry for the NCAA athletes who have a long season in normal years and are generally past their best by the time of the major championships, so next year will be even harder for them. It's not just the fact that the season is so long for them, but they have so many races. There are the odd few that manage to stay at their best until the end of the season, but they are very much the exceptions.
How many athletes in the NCAA will actually be needed for world relays this year? CMW for sure for Canada (if he even intends to come back to Georgia) and Nickisha Pryce for Jamaica (again, if she comes back) but other than that I can’t think of any other top international sprinters competing in the NCAA right now, most seem to be on the distance side and they won’t be needed for relays.
There may be a few here and there, but it could be a factor depending on the country. Your probably right that its not an overwhelming number of NCAA athletes, but 1-2 athletes from the NCAA, could be a deciding factor for a smaller country getting representation, especially if the top professionals don't go to world relays. Last year with Jamaica not making it showed that all it takes are a few mad decisions you a country loses it's opportunity to compete. But hopefully things work out.
Yea I think that may be the move. It could be that they released the 2025 Jamaican calendar and mistakenly kept the Championships in Late June, but eventually intend to move it to mid/late July or later
The Diamond League will be useless to an American audience due to Flo Track. Few people will pay exorbitant prices for poor coverage. Flo track is the worst thing to happen to American track ever probably. Absolutely ridiculous.
Useless may be a strong word, but I definitely hear you. The more subscriptions we have to pay for, the more complex it becomes to be able to be able to watch the sport we love. In a perfect world, we could just watch everything for free on RUclips, but I also understand and acknowledge that meets need to not only expand viewership but also make money and streaming for free it not always a smart financial move, which leads to subscriptions and increased prices. I will say to be fair that people still had to pay for Peacock to watch the Diamond league in previous years, now the price may have been different, but its a subscription. Its a tricky world when it comes to watching Track & Field
Yeah, Flotrack did GST a good turn by buying the American rights to the Diamond League, assuming GST is going to be on a platform where you don't have to pay through the nose.
@@TheFinalLegExcept you got so many other things with Peacock that you won’t with Flo.
For a T/F fanatic .. I love it 🎉 there’s gonna be complications for sure but overall ( personally speaking ) the more meets the better. I hope they’ll be televised or easy to stream 🤞🏾
Absolutely love your coverage 🤝🏾
Thanks for watching! Yea, for fans this will be great since we can watch so much track all year round. Now streaming is a whole other question since so many meets means we have to go around to different places to watch. But well see how this works out!
Wow, Anderson, thanks so much for this important survey and wonderful analysis of such complex information. Great points and observations!
Absolutely! Really do appreciate that bro!💯
Hey Anderson let me take this moment to commend you for the good job you are doing, very unbiased track and field news/highlights letting us fans be on know on what's happening or gonna happen. On this accept my gratitude and keep it up.
Really do appreciate that bro! We all definitely have bias and preference, but I definitely try to keep things as balanced as possible while giving my honest opinion. Thanks as always for watching!💯
Using the world relays to qualify for the world championship is the biggest problem especially for smaller countries who doesn't have the depth to send other athletes to replace the ones who are either in college or just injured or not in shape in May to qualify for WC
Yea its a big problem. I do understand the idea of qualifying your relays to get into the world championships, but the problem is because of how the sport is structured, a country's relay team don't always train together and each individual athlete schedules their season differently. And like you said, athletes may be college or other factors may arise. But a big issue is the location with it being out in China which is far for the majority of the nations who are competing for relay spots.
The diamond league is more of a European thing. The USA needs to cater to the sport domestically .
@@Terry-du3vcDefinitely for growth.
It’s a lot going on. As a TF fan it’s exciting but I do hope the athletes aren’t stressed with the schedule set up and all that traveling this yr
Agreed. Its great that we'll get to watch so much more track, but it will be a balance for athletes to manage everything next year. I think they best of the best will be able focus on the World championships and work backwards from there for the most part.
@ will the meets be on the big networks or peacock or just Flo track which I don’t watch.
Thanks Anderson for the thorough insight. It’ll be interesting to see where the dominoes fall this year. Overall, I see the diamond league taking the biggest hit - makes me wonder the impact on ROI for the likely most impacted cities that invested in those beautiful track stadiums.
Funny that your thumbnail pits MJ vs Coe - what are you really trying to say? lol
Thanks for watching! Yea I suspect the Diamond League might take the biggest hit in terms of quality, but not sure yet because many of those diamond league meets (Lausanne, Zurich, Monaco, Brussels, etc. are historical legacy meets. They will always be staples on the calendar and because Europe is always enthusiastic about track, they will get attendance. But the quality of the fields may likely be diminished relative to previous years.
Hahahaha I actually created 3 thumbnails are rotating now, but yea the main one is MJ next to Coe. I mean GST is the new venture, Diamond League is the existing World Athletics venture, just an interesting comparison with the "faces" of both, but no harm meant!
In regards to the athletes specifically, this upcoming season is going to display/expose who can manage their season well and peak accordingly for the World Championships at the end of the year.
There have been some athletes who race/jump/throw/compete all year round from indoor to outdoor and manage to successfully get on the podium at the Outdoor Championships with no major setbacks (Femkie Bol, Noah Lyles, Ryan Crouser, Mondo Duplantis etc).
Then there are other athletes who have successful indoor seasons but can't seem to replicate this success Outdoors.
As well as that, you have athletes who don't compete indoors at all, wait to the outdoor season, and either have a great season from nationals to Worlds/Olympics, etc, or a problematic one or an inconsistent one.
The athletes who are able to manage a balanced calendar as well as handle the travelling, the conditions at each event and not have major injury or fatigue issues, will be able to succeed at the Worlds in Japan in September. It's not enough to run fast times/throw or jump big distances at nationals and wait it out until the Worlds a month later. The schedule difference doesn't give most athletes the comfort like it used to before. So not only is it going to expose the best athletes from the pack, but it will display the methods coaches use for their athletes and if it is sustainable and helpful long term.
I do think some athletes are going to under/overcompete from this.
This is a great point, athletes and coaches will really have to lock in an ensure they are able to make appropriate decisions to manage the season well. World Indoors, World Relays, World Championships. The best of the best athletes will likely be fine, especially athletes who have wild cards to Worlds (Noah, Femke, Mondo, Sha'Carri, Paulino, etc.). But for everyone else the decisions they make will be key to success, especially if they decide to do Indoors this year. Could we see more athletes skip indoors and instead focus on running outdoors with the goal being worlds? How will NCAA athletes manage? Will be interesting to see how things play out!
Excellent analysis for any of the couch potatoes around the globe, especially those of us on the outer limits! Tony Hunt World Junior Athletics News NZL.
Haha thanks appreciate you!
Yes more meets more racing more rivalry more fun for me...😭😭🔥
@@k.o6157 Perhaps more diluted line-ups on each competition? There will be more competitions, but less talents in each, as athletes will not compete in more competitions than on last season, to prevent injuries.
Leads to more injuries and athletes dropping out from sheer exhaustion
@@TobyGuyana Exactly, but since coaches know how many competitions their athletes are capable of participating with minimum injury risk, the more probable outcome will be less talents in each competition.
@@trogpo for sure, either way it won’t be a perfect outcome but I guess this is how they will learn
More meets doesn't mean, guarantee or produce more competition. Athletes will be setting targets just as they always have.
I love that track doesn’t have a “bye” year anymore. If we wish to compete with other sports it was necessary
Yea that will be good to keep interest in the sport year after year. The off year would sometimes be a down time, but it will be interesting to see how athletes manage the year after year competitions. But as you say, other sports have championships every year so it makes sense for us to do the same in some way.
Jamaica usually schedules it's national track and field championships the same time as the US does, so I don't think there will be a conflict with Grand Slam Track.
I hope that ends up being the case. Jamaica released it's 2025 calendar already and national championships is on the 26th-29th which is why I included it in the video. Hopefully they plan to move it to a different date and maybe it was just oversight on their end in terms of scheduling.
@@TheFinalLegIt would be wild for Jamaica to have their championship so far ahead of the actual Worlds. I also think GST doesnt choose that week unless they knew it would be free of Champs. They don't mind fighting with the DL and Continental Tour but country champs is something different, especially during a Worlds year. Just puts up a barrier when they are trying to get the fastest and best racers.
Thanks for addressing this. The existence of GST might mean we don't see as many races during the season where the top ranked Europeans and Americans compete against one another, which would be ironic (because GST was meant to put all the top names in one event) and sad for fans who want to see these match ups. I can see Jamaica having issues again with world relays because the same team was just voted back in at JAAA. With regard Oceania athletes, Australia has its major outdoor meets from January and nationals in early April, from memory NZ nationals is early in the calendar too. Many athletes then go to Europe for DL and WA continental tour meets, because selection is done early athletes will know well in advance if they have to return for Tokyo WC so this should not be an issue for them. Finding where meets stream is always a nightmare for track fans but I'm old enough to remember when there was no livestream to look for so I'm just grateful for what we have.
Yea there wont be as my top Europeans vs Americans (ie Femke vs Sydney, Karsten vs Rai & Alison if Rai signs up). I think the problem is that though GST wants to bring the top athletes together, our sport is just way to global to accomodate all the top athletes in one location without allowing for them to be spread out amongst other competitions. Your right that Jamaica will have to figure things out with the relays next year because they are very much at risk of not qualifying again if they are not careful.
Thanks for the call out on Oceania + Australian athletes here. Will someone like Jessica Hull have issues when it comes to Nationals? I didn't check that.
@@TheFinalLeg I can't speak for NZ but Australian selectors have some lee way. At the moment there are four Australian women with the WC qualifying standard for the 1500m, and the top two at Nationals are guaranteed to go through. But if Jess Hull doesn't make Nationals she holds the AR and has a Silver medal from the OG which I would think almost certainly means she's selected. If you look at the selection process for the OG national record holders and athletes on the podium at WC were the first selected - Nina Kennedy, Patterson and Olyslagers, Matt Denny and Jess herself. The only way this could become an issue is if they insist she races at Nationals because another athlete has the qualifying standard. Even then I think she has time to return from Jamaica in time to compete or GST doesn't expect her to compete in that meet. I know she was in discussions with GST for a long time before signing and I'm guessing her attendance at Australian nationals must've been part of the conversation. This is all guesswork as neither Jess nor the selectors have said anything yet but I can't see her not being selected for WC.
Jamaica Athletics Association may move our champs to July. Let’s see.
Yea I think thats the most likely thing, either moving to July or to early August to be closer to world championships.
Great analysis of the upcoming athletics schedule.
Another issue with Grand Slam Track is that it’s too US based to be compared with the Tennis Grand Slams (Which has Grand Slams spread across the world) the way MJ likes to. 3 of the 4 Slams are US based which gives the Athletes based there a great advantage. I can’t believe they couldnt secure at least one European location (or somewhere else in the world) for an event to even out the playing field a little and encourage more top non US athletes to sign up and compete.
Decisions decisions decisions 🤔
There's something odd to me about isolating an entire group of athletes to compete in a very specific league, and then to essentially leave the rest of the field (DL racers) to race later in the year before championships. Not that there won't be *some* crossover ( idk honestly), but given the average athlete is barely even racing 8 times in a single season to begin with (most aren't tbh), I just don't understand why Grand Slam feels the need to effectively monopolize a certain group of athletes so that we'll almost never see them in another racing format again.
It sucks because I love the concept of a new track league coming to the scene and forcing things like the DL, FloTrack, and others to get their act together and put some care into the sport, but I think MJ's approach is really confusing, a bit gimmicky, and perhaps way too optimistic with the way he touts it as the "savior" of the sport when most of the meets are during the least exciting part of the season lol.
There's a lot more I could say and have written down elsewhere, but I'm just... really confused is all lol.
Weird take. There's nothing "isolating" about Grand Slam. Pushing worlds or any meet to September is the real problem
Interesting, curious what you mean by isolation? Its a league so signing them makes sense to ensure they compete in their specific meets and they are still allowed to compete in the Diamond league, Continental tour, other meets, if they chose. But your correct that most athletes dont compete as frequently as you would expect (top athletes in 2024 sprints/hurdles in 2024 raced about 15+ times a year including rounds at trials/Olympics).
I think one thing to keep in mind is how track is currently structured. Its basically a free for all where athletes do whatever they want however they want. They could race in the USA, then be in London, then Hungary, then Kenya, back in the USA etc. Its cool to see them around, but its also not structured in any way for us to follow athletes week to week or for us to understand what each meet means. Thats not to say GST meets mean anything yet (each meet is an individual Slam with no connection to the previous one) but there at least is structure around the idea that fans will see their athletes compete at a specific place a few times though the year. No one is guaranteed to show up to a diamond League or even USA Champs if they have a wild card to worlds (see: Grant Holloway every other year). In general, we do get to see the best athletes compete, but from the viewer perspective its not great knowing you paid $X for a stream and your favorite athlete pulled out for no clear reason.
I dont ever thing Track will become like NBA, NFL, MLB etc, BUT I do think Michael Johnson sees there is some structure in these other sports than can be applied to track and he's starting with GST. Its not perfect and may not even work as expected next year, but I think its a move in the right direction towards something that could be slightly better than what exists.
Thanks for watching!
@@TheFinalLeg GST athletes are allowed to compete in other leagues, but the EV of competing in other races outside of GST becomes substantially lower if you're contractually signed to the league. After GST has run its course for the year, why would anyone even bother to race at any DL/Continental Tour after 8 races under their belt, after they've made more money than they ever had through the DL, especially with their national and world championships to worry about? The DL money sucks, the competition level is inconsistent, and some just don't wanna travel to Europe unless they absolutely have to lol. It's just -EV in the end unless you *really* love competing that much.
I haven't checked every single athlete, but outside of hurdles (and a few sprinters), they're just not in more than 8 finals throughout an entire year, let alone jamming 8 of them within the first couple months of the season and *then* expecting a conventional DL circuit where they'll be running some fast TT's too? It would be an absolute treat for the fans, don't get me wrong, but idk it doesn't seem realistic for a majority of the disciplines. It also doesn't help that I despise the double-event gimmick of GST to begin with, but that's another discussion for another time lol.
@@RunnerBoi I hear you for sure and I think I do agree that most athletes will make more money than ever in GST so won't be inclined to run much after. I don't keep as close an eye on the distance athletes so not sure about their frequency but your probably right. I think short hurdlers are the only ones who will compete frequently after, along with some sprinters.
The one thing to keep in mind is that Track & Field doesn't have any current Leagues. The Diamond League is a glorified collection of invitational meets. Same with American Track League, Continental tour, etc. That's why athletes can compete outside of GST.
But yea I don't disagree with being skeptical about things since it's (technically) never been done before in this formal (see the ITA from the 70s). On a baseline I'm optimistic for 2025 since it's the early part of the season and I like the names who have signed up so far. But will see how things actually play out.
Very solid video.
Appreciate you💯
Mu and McLaughlin barely run now, the Diamond league will never see them.
Sydney ran pretty frequently this year relative to previous years and relative to other top athletes (check the recent video I did on it) Now we will see her run 2 times at 4 meets for sure next year. On top of that, she will run USAs and Worlds. I know that she likely wont be in the Diamond League, but theres tons of athletes who generally only compete in Europe and dont come to the USA. So its all a balance. No idea about Mu since she was injured last year.
As a track fan it is good to have this many choices for athletes. As an American the sad thing is the poor coverage…but hey why would the IAAF care about American fans when USATF doesn’t care.
The coverage is very tough when theres so many streaming services, subscriptions, TV channels for various meets in different countries around the world, etc. But we'll see how things play out next year and hopefully things are as accessible as possible for fans
Jamaica putting their Nationals back seems like a sensible option, although what would seem even more sensible is if these diffierent bodies/organisations actually communicated with each other, so scheduling conflicts could be reduced. I realise, to some extent, Gland Slam and Wanda are competitors, but they both want the same thing, which is to attract more fans to athletics, so it makes sense for them to work together to achieve this goal. That said, I don't really see Grand Slam/Diamond League conflicts as much of an issue, given that athletes don't compete in every DL event anyway. You could view this as athletes having more choice of when and where to compete. Season length is an issue, but that's always the case with late Globals. Seb Coe has said that he ideally wants the Globals to be the final event of the season, but obviously that's not always the best option when they are being held in places like Northern Europe where the weather is already in decline by that time.
I doubt too many athletes/coaches will have too much of a hard time with scheduling. They will decide their priorities early in the season. If they want to compete at Globals, they will have to compete at Nationals or whatever the qualifying event is. They will obviously change their personal schedules throughout the season, depending on how things are going at the time, but that happens every season anyway.
The thing I'm not sure about is the Gland Slam contracts. From what I've seen, it seems like the athletes are contracted to compete at every event, so if there is a conflict, particularly like Jamaican Nationals, they have to choose whether or not to honour their contract. That could potentially result in top athletes missing Globals, which doesn't seem like a good way to bring more people to the sport. Maybe there has been communication in this regard between MJ and World Athletics.
It was already a great time to be a track fan, now we get even more. Sounds good to me, assuming it doesn't cause issues.
I think Michael has spoken with World Athletics and they did attempt to reduce the scheduling conflicts as much as possible. At a base line, the only conflict between GST and Diamond League is the Shanghai meet in May. But outside of that, GST kept things early in the year and not going into July or August which would have made it more complicated. As you said, most athletes dont run every diamond league race anyway, and based on the schedule, they can run GST, then in July/August run a bunch of diamond leagues.
The bigger issue, as we both note, is the length of the track season. Because worlds is late in the year AND there is world indoors and world relays in early may, athletes will have to make some serious decisions on how they will plan out their years and if they will even decide to run indoors. The top athletes should have too many issues, but it will be the athletes who are on the cusp of making a team or getting on the podium who will have to be very strategic about the year.
Regarding GST contracts and conflicts, I wouldn't be surprised if they simply allow athletes to compete at National championships, or if Jamaica moves their national champs to July/august closer to worlds. June is very early so we'll see what happens.
Appreciate the comment!
@@TheFinalLeg I don't think many athletes will be too concerned about World Indoors making the season even longer. There have always been athletes that like to compete indoors and those that don't. The ones that do always have a longer season as a result, but many of them still do well even at the end of the outdoor season. We always have a good idea of who will and won't compete, although there are sometimes surprises, but, for example, it's a fairly safe bet that Femke will be at World Indoors and Sydney won't.
I feel more sorry for the NCAA athletes who have a long season in normal years and are generally past their best by the time of the major championships, so next year will be even harder for them. It's not just the fact that the season is so long for them, but they have so many races. There are the odd few that manage to stay at their best until the end of the season, but they are very much the exceptions.
How many athletes in the NCAA will actually be needed for world relays this year? CMW for sure for Canada (if he even intends to come back to Georgia) and Nickisha Pryce for Jamaica (again, if she comes back) but other than that I can’t think of any other top international sprinters competing in the NCAA right now, most seem to be on the distance side and they won’t be needed for relays.
There may be a few here and there, but it could be a factor depending on the country. Your probably right that its not an overwhelming number of NCAA athletes, but 1-2 athletes from the NCAA, could be a deciding factor for a smaller country getting representation, especially if the top professionals don't go to world relays. Last year with Jamaica not making it showed that all it takes are a few mad decisions you a country loses it's opportunity to compete. But hopefully things work out.
@ninz5250
Nakisha price no longer in school this was senior year she’s fully a professional athlete now..
Jamaican trial kept in july in 2023 so i hope thats what do again
Yea I think that may be the move. It could be that they released the 2025 Jamaican calendar and mistakenly kept the Championships in Late June, but eventually intend to move it to mid/late July or later
Dang mights as well stay in China for start of season
Yea it seems to literally be set up for athletes to just stay in China for April/May
can grand slam athletes run Diamond League?
Yes they can