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Compiled by David Melly and Paul Snyder

Third Time’s The Charm For Grand Slam Track 🔁

It turns out that good things do come in threes.

Last weekend, Michael Johnson and his merry band of athletes took his Grand Slam Track circus to Philadelphia’s historic Franklin Field, debuting a newly-streamlined program and two-day meet format to generally positive reviews. Perhaps the most important change of all came just outside the oval: the fans. Kingston had a large (and largely empty) stadium, Miami had a tiny, but full stadium, and Philly finally delivered the best of both worlds. It’s noticeable how much a loud, high-energy crowd improves the event both on television and in-stadium, and Philly’s estimated 10,000+ ticket sales paid off for everyone watching from home as well.

It can’t hurt that the races themselves gave the fans plenty to cheer about. GST claiming the mantle of “only the fastest” for itself and its athletes was a big swing right off the bat, and three meets in… well, they’re kinda right.

The king and queen of the sprint circuit right now are Melissa Jefferson-Wooden and Kenny Bednarek. Kenny is a perfect six-for-six in Slam races, including two sub-20 200ms and two sub-10 100ms. This weekend, he ran a lifetime-best 9.86 in the 100m and a 19.95 in the 200m, defeating the likes of Andre De Grasse, Christian Coleman, and Zharnel Hughes in the process. Sure, GST hasn’t managed to entice Letsile Tebogo or Noah Lyles to show up just yet, but the guys who did toe the line have a whole heap of World and Olympic medals of their own. And with the way Bednarek is running, it sure doesn’t feel like he’s a step behind either Tebogo (season’s bests: 10.03 and 20.10) or Lyles, whom Bednarek beat in their last matchup.

Melissa Jefferson-Wooden may have an even stronger case for capital-F Fastest after this weekend. Heading into the year, the big question hovering over MJW was whether the Olympic bronze medalist over 100m had what it takes to contend over twice the distance… and on Saturday, she beat Olympic 200 champ Gabby Thomas head-to-head in a new lifetime best of 21.99. That’s the third-fastest time in the world this year behind Thomas’s performance in Miami and Julien Alfred’s in Gainesville. And then she came back the next day in relatively cool, windy weather and ran an incredible 10.73 in the 100m, winning by a gargantuan 0.3-second gap and equalling the tenth-fastest performance of all time.

Kenny and Melissa aren’t the only world leaders to come out of GST. Currently, the fastest times of 2025 in the men’s 100m* and women’s 100m, 400m, 100H, 400H, 1500m*, and 5000m were all set at GST meets (*Bednarek’s 9.86 and Welteji’s 3:58.04 are tied with other marks). Sure, it’s still relatively early, but there have been four Diamond League meets already this season compared to three Slams.

Those, like MJ himself, who claim that time doesn’t matter haven’t gone home disappointed either. The men’s 1500m in Philadelphia featured the reigning World and Olympic champions battling down the homestretch stride-for-stride—only to both lose the Slam title overall when World 800m champion Marco Arop managed to hold off World Indoor 800m champion Josh Hoey by 0.07 seconds in the 1500m, clocking a 3:35.38 PB that almost certainly wouldn’t have happened without this race format.

We got Ackera Nugent vs. Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, two of the best hurdlers in the world at different distances, facing off over a flat 100m. Never mind that Sydney’s time was nearly half a second behind Melissa’s—the unique nature of the race itself was the draw. And while Alison dos Santos has few rivals over 400m hurdles (neither of which have shown up at GST yet), he managed to lose his first race of the year by hundredths behind Chris Robinson and eventual Long Hurdles Slampion Trevor Bassitt. Dos Santos was 2/100ths away from tying Bassitt exactly across two events in both points and time and 3/100ths from winning. That works out to $16,667 per 0.01 second!

Speaking of competition: how’s the whole Racers vs. Challengers thing going?

Somewhat unsurprisingly, the Racers have retained a fairly significant edge in the standings. Challengers won three events in Philly to Racers’ nine, and overall, eight different Challengers have picked up $100,000 compared with sixteen Racers (some of whom have double-dipped already). The competition has been tight, however. This weekend, Jasmine Jones became the first athlete to win a Slam without winning an individual title, as she took second place in both Long Hurdles events to win a Sydney-less category with only 16 points total. Three events in Philly were decided by one point, and in two of those three, a Racer just barely edged out a Challenger.

If there’s one wrinkle yet to be fully ironed out, it’s the persistent challenge of fitting distance events into the Grand Slam model. For Philadelphia, organizers decided to reduce the Long Distance races from two to one—and more importantly, halve the prize money. Most bizarrely, the event they decided to keep was the 3000m, not the 5000m. It’s unclear why saving five-ish minutes of race time justifies picking an off event as your single showcase, particularly given the universal understanding of the 5k distance thanks to road races around the world. And it doesn’t feel fair to steeply cut down on prize money for one race category, particularly for the signed Racers who presumably planned their seasons months ago around the expectation of eight races and the paychecks they promised.

That said, the 3000m races in Philly were far from boring, particularly for the men, where newcomer Nico Young blitzed a 26.51 final 200m and 2:20 final kilometer to defeat fellow former NCAA champ Ky Robinson and a strong field. The absence of Grant Fisher, who withdrew with a hamstring issue before the start, made for greater uncertainty, but now fans will have to wait until LA or, more likely, USAs for Young to test his improved footspeed against the Olympic medalist.

There’s not an easy solution for the 3k/5k conundrum GST finds itself grappling with, but if there’s any reason for optimism, it’s that clearly the League is not yet precious about preserving its format in the face of criticism. For years, the power brokers of professional track’s response when something wasn’t working has been to either ignore the problem entirely or simply insist that anyone raising doubts is wrong. Where Michael Johnson and the Grand Slam crew deserve a lot of credit is their willingness to be responsive, to make changes on the fly, and to use the inaugural season as an incubator rather than doggedly insisting that the concept came into existence fully-formed and unimpeachable.

As GST makes like the Fresh Prince and heads from Philadelphia to Los Angeles, the mission is clear: keep doing what works well, and remain open to change. So far we’ve gotten most of what we want from the League, and the dwindling wish list really only has a few things left—some of which are more achievable than others. Hopefully the final Slam features one or two marquee Challengers that have thus far not been enticed to compete against the likes of, say, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone or Alison dos Santos. Hopefully one of the men makes like Jessica Hull and delivers an honest 1500m for a little variety after three races between 3:34.4 and 3:35.1. And hopefully fan favorites like Nikki Hiltz and Yared Nuguse come out with long-awaited wins after a few near misses.

Regardless of what does happen in LA, there’s one thing Grand Slam has thrice proven beyond a reasonable doubt: these meets are worth watching.

What USATF Is Trying To Tell Us About The Olympic Marathon Trials 👟

USATF has shared the qualifying standards for the 2028 Olympic Trials Marathon, and we have some thoughts. 

First and foremost… there seemingly will be another Olympic Trials! That’s not exactly the sexiest take to start of this section, but ever since the financial albatross that was the Atlanta 2020 Trials, the continued existence of this race has felt far from guaranteed. So yeah, we’re going to go ahead and celebrate a little that the governing body tasked with selecting America’s Olympic team for track and field thinks highly enough of the Trials system to trot out qualification standards ahead of 2028: 2:16:00 for the men (1:03:00 in the half) and 2:37:00 for the women (1:12:00, likewise).

About those standards… because while the existence of this race going forward is one question, the second and related debate American closely follows: how big should the field size be, and why? Is this solely a selection race? A developmental carrot and/or stick? A celebration of the sub-elite side of the sport that rarely gets its flowers?

If the times look familiar, that’s because they mostly are— the one time that’s changed vis-a-vis 2024 is the men’s marathon standard, which got two minutes faster. In the most recent Trials, 139 of the 220 qualified runners would’ve still qualified under the new standard. It’s a tightening, but not a radical one.

These cut-offs—aimed at inviting fields of roughly 200 athletes per category—suggest USATF is trying to split the difference among all three objectives. And you know what? Good for them. Those are all admirable goals, and it’s hard to see how pursuing multiple could be truly detrimental to any single one…

…With one notable caveat. We’re back into “A” and “B” standard territory, which means that only athletes who attain the “A” standard will receive travel funding to the Trials. It’s a bit of a blow to those looking to recapture the free love hotel rooms of Woodstock Atlanta ‘20, but clearly USATF doesn’t want to make the prospect of hosting the Trials so financially onerous for a host city that nobody bids. While there’s no denying how badly the transfer of that strain onto the athlete will suck for some, but big picture, it’s a reasonable price to pay for the continued running of this event.

(This isn’t a takeaway, as much as it is a reminder and plea. Going significantly over budget for an event like this means overspending by something like several million dollars. Which is a lot, but we aren’t talking billions, or likely even tens of millions. So if any benevolent and quirky celebrities or financiers are reading this and want to help out a handful of less-well-off OTQ-types realize a dream, please give the good folks at USATF a shout. For instance, if any touring members of Public Enemy subscribe, please forward this email to Flavor Flav.)

One more nuts-and-bolts change to the qualifying rules is that the accepted entries list will be populated by chip time, rather than gun time. That’s great, and makes a ton of sense, particularly for women, who often get pushed back and bumped off the front of the starting line, and any first-time marathoner, who may lack the resume for race directors to award them elite entry. What’s a bit baffling is that this rule was not changed in the last cycle, given that there was a relatively high-profile instance in 2020 of a deserving athlete not being granted a qualification despite running minutes under the old standard of 2:45 via her chip time. Regardless, it’s a welcome improvement. Perhaps in 2028 we’ll send a CITIUS MAG Hat to the qualifier with the biggest disparity between their gun and chip times.

And finally, a take that’s less a take a more of a wishlist item/suggestion to steal from other sports. Any member of the 2016, 2020, or 2024 U.S. Olympic marathon squads who happen to be an active USATF member in good standing is already considered to possess the “A” standard. That means very-much-retired legends like Meb Keflezighi and Shalane Flanagan could line up if they want. It’s pretty rare in this sport for an athlete to receive their deserved adulation during the sort of retirement tour athletes in other sports tend to get. We may not be able to give them stadiums of fans all over the country and a year-long celebration of all they’ve done to inspire the next generation, but surely we can hit them with a tribute video on the starting line (set to M83’s “Outro” if Flav pays the licensing fee).

All in all, the 2028 standards reflect business as usual, for the most part. What USATF is saying, essentially, is that the Marathon Trials are a well-designed, albeit expensive, event and that the governing body is interested in replicating the successes of Orlando and Atlanta. That won’t rock the boat, but it keeps the ship afloat, which in this case is an undeniable victory.

What Makes An Athlete “Good” At Social Media? 💻

Last week, Jakob Ingebrigtsen dropped a video—and some wisdom—to his Instagram.

He’s chin-deep in water, aquajogging during his rehab for an Achilles flare-up that’s kept him out of races for most of the spring. Over a grainy film filter and trippy background instrumental, he offers a quasi-philosophical musing on the nature of pain.

“Remember,” he pants, “it’s not the pain that kills you. It’s the realization of pain… so you just have to turn off and not realize that you’re in pain. Then you will be able to do the things you like… with high quality and success.”

He pauses, struggling to stay afloat and let his moribund fortune-cookie sentiment land. “I just—I just made that up,” he concludes, then bursts out laughing.

The video itself isn’t particularly visually remarkable and the words themselves are, frankly, nonsense. Jakob isn’t an infrequent poster, nor is he a stranger to video content (he has a YouTube channel with 70,000 subscribers and has been the subject of at least two reality TV series). But that 35-second clip perfectly encapsulates the off-camera phenomenon that is Jakob Ingebrigtsen, Media Personality: a strange mix of positivity, ego, and zen-like focus, simultaneously cold and goofy, and determined to communicate something—even if it’s not always clear what or why—with his audience.

Regular readers will know that the public perception of Jakob and his closest rivals is a source of endless fascination for the Lap Count crew. On paper, Ingebrigtsen should be easily cast as the villain: a cocky wunderkind with all the resources that Nike and the Kingdom of Norway can provide, complete with a regal air and high and tight hairstyle. Doggedly convinced of his own greatness, but irritable and defensive in response to the lightest criticism. This guy is the Draco Malfoy of track and field, right? Why does anyone like him?

And yet, they do. Ingebrigtsen has scores of passionate fans, tweeting fan cams, nicknaming him “Babygirl,” and rushing to his defense at any perceived slight. All the greatest athletes have one thing in common: their stans are as vocal and passionate as their haters. Jakob may not be quite as popular as LeBron James, or Caitlin Clark, or Tom Brady, but he shares their ability to both inspire and polarize. And that’s an ability that can’t come solely from performance on the track: it results from the things he says and does before and after a race.

Jakob Ingebrigtsen is not the most universally beloved track athlete, nor the most followed, but he’s one of the sport’s strongest communicators. He (and those around him—let’s not forget that athletes’ personalities would be much more of a mystery without photographers, videographers, producers, and sports journalists) is remarkably effective at painting a clear picture of himself that evokes a strong response from the track and field audience. It’s not always a positive response, but the net result is inarguably good: it’s not hard to get a sense of Jakob’s personality, his thinking, and how he interacts with the world. The first step to loving someone is to know them.

Despite the resurgence of the sports documentary as a form, and the explosion of running content on YouTube, the clearest conduit from athlete to fan remains social media. What is it, exactly, that makes some sports personalities better at harnessing the platform than others?

Despite an increasingly blurry line, there remains an important distinction between an athlete using social media to further their career and an athlete becoming a social media influencer. It can be hard to distinguish one from the other, but a simple way is to follow the money. If an individual’s primary source of income depends on their performance, they’re an athlete with a media presence. If their main business is media, they’re an influencer. Nick Symmonds may have once been paid primarily to run 800ms, but that’s not what his 2024 tax return would indicate.

Being a runfluencer is ultimately a different thing, but the backlash often sparked by a late-career pivot from “runner with product endorsements” to “product endorser who also runs” is telling. Because the most precious commodity for an athlete in the public eye isn’t attractiveness, or humor, or even relatability. It’s authenticity.

When it comes to sports fandom, people’s bullshit sensors are surprisingly fine-tuned. They don’t like the feeling of being lied to, or misled, or hard-sold. Perhaps this is why doping offenses elicit such a strong emotional reaction from large swaths of the track and field community: it’s not simply the injustice of cheating at a system that’s supposed to be fair; it’s hiding the true nature of a performance from the public.

Authenticity is not a value judgment—people can be deeply and authentically unlikeable. But it’s human nature to try and bridge the gap between a fan sitting on their couch and an athlete standing on the starting line with some sense of connection, and that’s where social media comes in.

Track and field is full of great personalities. But some are better than others at sharing that personality with the world. Craig Engels isn’t just a fan favorite for his mustache and mullet; it’s his willingness to share a race day vlog with the caption “Try to count how many times I pooped.” Gabby Thomas has surely won more friends than enemies for her willingness to clap back at trolls on Twitter. And Anna Hall’s 7000-point performance at Gotzis was made all the sweeter because fans were with her for every painful step back from her 2024 surgery.

Of course, it cuts both ways. Just as public sentiment seems to have shifted in Jakob’s favor, it feels like Josh Kerr has picked up more detractors at the same time. There are many factors at play, many of which are the very same qualities and dynamics the two rivals share: a healthy ego, unabashedly high goals, expensive-looking haircuts, and a willingness to comment obliquely or even directly about one another. But one contributing factor very well could be Kerr’s handing off the reins of his social media accounts to professionals sometime in 2023, a change he attributed at the time to prioritizing his training and mental focus. The result, however, was a noticeable change in the tone and style of his Instagram posts to curated model shots with SEO-friendly hashtags like “#athletemotivation” and “#joshkerr.”

Other athletes have faced similarly negative reactions when fans feel they’re being duped. While Kenny Bednarek remains a popular and closely-followed figure on the GST circuit, the widespread rumors that his camp was behind an anonymous Twitter account hasn’t helped his public image. Shelby Houlihan’s burrito saga did irreparable damage to the brand and reputation of an athlete who was previously known for her love of French bread and Harry Potter. And we can’t forget when Camille Herron got caught with her hand in the Wikpedia cookie jar, editing positive mentions of herself and negative mentions of other runners into articles.

What, if anything, professional athletes “owe” to fans in terms of access and transparency is a complicated discussion. But it’s clear that the most successful sportspeople online are those who are able to successfully harness the platforms at their disposal to tell their story in a way that galvanizes strong emotions and ultimately, a strong sense of attachment from viewers and fans.

At the end of the day, the golden goose for athletes isn’t keeping things positive, or informative, or funny. It’s simply keeping it real.

More News From The Track And Field World 📰

– The DI NCAA Preliminary Round competitions were held last weekend, despite frequent weather delays that, among other things, pushed the East Regional men’s 10,000m back to 1am on Thursday night. While these meets are largely a four-day table-setting process for the NCAA championship, the sprinters in particular didn’t wait for Eugene to pop off. In the East, Abdul-Rasheed Saminu of South Florida and Ghana ran a wind-legal, world-leading 9.86 in the 100m, and in the West, Arkansas’s Jordan Anthony responded with a wind-aided but nevertheless ridiculous 9.75 to lead all qualifiers. In an amazing display of both fearlessness and regional parity, both the East and West regional women’s 800ms were won in sub-1:59 marks, setting up a showdown between Michaela Rose of LSU (1:58.91) and Meghan Hunter of BYU (1:58.95) next week in Eugene.

– At the Kip Keino Classic, held in Nairobi, Kenya (just shy of 6,000 feet), South Africa’s Zakithi Nene became the second man under 44 seconds for 400m this year, going 43.76. Canadian hammer thrower Ethan Katzberg heaved his way to a world lead of his own: 82.73m, while his compatriot Camryn Rogers chucked it 77.93m to secure victory. America’s breakout 1500m star Jonah Koech returned to his traditional 800m distance and won there, too, going 1:43.32. Kenya’s Lilian Odira won a loaded 800m of her own in 1:58.31.

– American Anna Hall looks to have bounced back from the heartbreak of her fifth-place showing at the Paris Olympics. The 24-year-old heptathlete put up 7,032 points at the Hypomeeting in Götzis, Austria—her nearly 500-point margin of victory was good for a new meet record as well as a tie for the second best heptathlon ever, behind only her hero, Jackie Joyner-Kersee. The craziest part of her already crazy performance is that she capped her weekend with a 2:01.23, the fastest heptathlon 800m ever run.

– At the Irena Szewińska Memorial (held in Bydgoszcz, Poland), Swiss 800m up-and-comer Audrey Werro lowered her own national record as she broke the tape in 1:57.25. Spanish 800m record-holder Mohamed Attoui stepped up to the 1500m and delivered, going 3:33.30 for the win. And Payton Otterdahl claimed victory in the shot, thanks to a 21.59m throw.

– Meanwhile, also in Poland, two greats of ultrarunning had their 48-hour world records broken. Local legend Patrycja Bereznowska covered 271.148 miles sneaking past Camille Herron’s mark by about .6 miles, and Belgium’s Matthieu Bonne went 301.426 miles to beat Greece’s Yiannis Kouros’s 29-year-old record by a whopping 7.2 miles.

— A little farther south in Rovereto, Italy, the 61st Palio Città della Quercia featured a host of strong pro results, especially in the women’s 1500m where Nadia Battocletti dropped down in distance and still ran 3:58.15 for the win ahead of Australian Linden Hall (3:58.70) and Americans Helen Schlachtenhaufen (4:00.69) and Dani Jones (4:03.35).

— NCAA DII 100m/200m national record holder Alexis Brown has a shot at a few more records next year, as she’s headed to Division I and the University of South Carolina in the fall.

— Congratulations are in order for Brittany Anderson, the 2022 World 100m hurdles silver medalist for Jamaica. She has shared in an Instagram post that she has gotten married and is pregnant with her first child. 

– The entry lists for this year’s Portland Track Festival (June 14th–15th) are out and one name in particular might stand out: Donavan Brazier is slated to race the 800m! Brazier last raced in the 800m semis at the 2022 World Championships.

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