World Indoors 2012, Instanbul, Turkey, from Larry Eder’s iphone
The World Indoor Championships is a wonderful event. I went to the 2008, 2010 and 2013 events, and they are a wonderful showcase of indoor track & field. It is positive to see USA Track & Field and Tracktown USA, as rumored, bidding for the World Indoors in 2016.
It is important that the world’s most powerful and successful track & field federation bid and host World Championships. For some reason, many countries think our sport is near death or, on auto-pilot here. The truth is much more complicated.
A very healthy high school sport, that gives the most diverse group of kids a chance to compete.
We have some great college programs, but we also have a system that battles with an over taxed and over emphasized sports culture, which elevates athletic activity over life long participation, life long search and thirst for knowledge. Where and how do we put sport in its proper place in our culture?
On the elite side we have a sport, sometimes, still mired in the 19th century, with some groups all vying for little fiefdoms. Thankfully, we have some events, managers, athletes and groups working together, to find the big answers.
I see the positive actions, some very small, as the way of the future. A friend, out of the sport for a decade came back and chastised me, noting: “Nothing has changed.”
Hosting international events, supporting the successful events and building on them and asking the tough questions, that is how we lead instead of follow in the future.
Some see the glass as half empty, I see the glass as full of opportunities. I salute Tracktown USA and USA TF for putting our sport on the global stage.
Also available on the USATF website: http://www.usatf.org/News/U-S--bids-for-2016-World-Indoors.aspx
U.S. bids for 2016 World Indoors
INDIANAPOLIS – USA Track & Field has formally submitted to the IAAF a bid to host the 2016 World Indoor Championships, it announced Monday.
TrackTown USA, Inc., would serve as local organizing committee for the 16th IAAF World Indoor Championships in Athletics, which would be held in March, 2016, in Portland, Ore. The United States hosted the first IAAF World Indoor Championships in 1987, in Indianapolis. More than 600 athletes from up to 212 countries are expected to compete in 2016.
The bid application calls for the three-day meet to be held at the Oregon Convention Center in the city of Portland. A new 200-meter IAAF-certified track would be built and then repurposed afterward as a legacy of the event.
“As a member of the IAAF family, USATF considers it an honor as well as a duty to try to bring a world championship event back to U.S. soil,” USATF CEO Max Siegel said. “Having hosted two very successful Olympic Trials in 2008 and 2012, TrackTown USA has shown itself to be the premier host of world-class track events in this country. We look forward to presenting the bid and continuing to elevate the off-track profile of the United States in the international sports world.”
At the 2012 IAAF World Indoor Championships in Turkey, Team USA won a record 10 gold medals, adding three silver and five bronze. World Indoor gold-medal winners Ashton Eaton, Sanya Richards-Ross, Brittney Reese and Aries Merritt went on to win gold at the 2012 Olympic Games in London.
In addition to hosting the last two Olympic Trials, TrackTown USA also serves as local organizing committee for the 2014 IAAF World Junior Championships, to be contested this July in Eugene, Ore., and the 2016 U.S. Olympic Trials.
“We want to partner with USA Track & Field and the IAAF in bringing our sport to a new generation of athletes and fans,” said Vin Lananna, president of TrackTown USA, Inc. “Portland is a young, vibrant and beautiful city with a culture that fosters innovation and embraces active lifestyles. We believe the city of Portland, the state of Oregon and the entire U.S. would embrace the athletes, officials and media from around the world.”
USATF and TrackTown USA will present the bid to the IAAF in person on November 15 in Monaco.
For more information on USA Track & Field, visit www.usatf.org
For more information on TrackTown USA, visitwww.gotracktownusa.com
Larry Eder has had a 52-year involvement in the sport of athletics. Larry has experienced the sport as an athlete, coach, magazine publisher, and now, journalist and blogger. His first article, on Don Bowden, America's first sub-4 minute miler, was published in RW in 1983. Larry has published several magazines on athletics, from American Athletics to the U.S. version of Spikes magazine. He currently manages the content and marketing development of the RunningNetwork, The Shoe Addicts, and RunBlogRun. Of RunBlogRun, his daily pilgrimage with the sport, Larry says: "I have to admit, I love traveling to far away meets, writing about the sport I love, and the athletes I respect, for my readers at runblogrun.com, the most of anything I have ever done, except, maybe running itself." Also does some updates for BBC Sports at key events, which he truly enjoys. Theme song: Greg Allman, " I'm no Angel."
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