The Podium stars in its debut as a world-class track & field facility...
SPOKANE--As several hundred athletes made the trip from most parts of the Pacific Northwest to compete in Saturday's Spokane Invitational, the star of the show was clearly The Podium, downtown Spokane's brand new indoor track and field facility.
Eleven days into the 2021-22 collegiate season, the meet offered a first for those teams from the Pacific Northwest making the trek to Spokane--an opportunity to compete in a meet in December.
With the scarcity of indoor tracks on the West Coast, nearly all of the teams and clubs that showed up would normally open their seasons on the second weekend in January. But the Spokane Invitational gave those who competed something to gauge their fitness going into the holidays after spending most of the fall doing conditioning and base work to prepare for both the indoor and outdoor track season.
If you went to The Podium expecting to see marks that you'd normally see at the end of January, you were disappointed.
That said, three of the best marks of Saturday's meet came from Washington State University's US Olympic Trials qualifier Sam Brixey (above/Paul Merca photo) and the University of Washington's Makenna Barton & Aaliyah Wilson.
After winning his qualifying heat in a time of 7.83 over Cougar multi-eventer Cody Teevens, who also made the finals in 8.47, Brixey topped his time from earlier in the meet, taking the victory in 7.82 over teammate and fellow Pac-12 scorer Nick Johnson, who ran 8.05.
For what it's worth, Brixey's time is the fifth fastest in the world so far in the 2021-22 indoor season, while Johnson's mark is tied for eighth in the world.
Barton then proceeded to clear an indoor lifetime best of 13-7.25/4.15m on her first attempt, before closing things out with three misses at an all-time best of 14-1.25/4.30m.
Aaliyah Wilson of Washington won the women's 60 dash in a time of 7.42, currently tied for the 12th fastest in the world so far this season.
Even with the scarcity of world class marks, there was joy all around the track, especially from those athletes from the four Washington NCAA Division II schools--Central Washington, Saint Martin's, Seattle Pacific, Western Washington, plus Western Oregon--who hadn't stepped on an indoor track for a meaningful competition since February 2020.
You knew that the opening of The Podium was a big deal when The Godfather of track and field in the Inland Empire, retired Washington State University and 2000 US Olympic men's coach John Chaplin made an appearance to check out the facility.
As Gonzaga head coach Pat Tyson described The Podium, “I watched the kids’ faces and it was like they got a brand new car. It’s like that episode of ‘The Wonder Years’ where they go shopping for a new car. Kevin wanted the convertible, but they ended up getting the station wagon.
“Well, we got the Mercedes."
As is expected with a brand new facility, there were a few minor hiccups, notably the long jump takeoff boards set too close to the sand pits, and an overheated oven in the concession stands that set off a fire alarm and almost caused evacuation of The Podium towards the end of the meet.
Aside from that, the video display board was superb, and the field event boards were excellent, though at times they would switch from whatever field event you were tracking to a running event. Those are things that The Podium's facilities and technical people can work on over the course of the winter, as it will host numerous indoor meets, cumulating with the Toyota USATF Indoor championships at the end of February.
Complete results of the Spokane Invitational are available here.
NOTE: RunnerSpace, The Podium and the sports information offices of Eastern Washington, Seattle Pacific, Gonzaga, University of Washington, Washington State, Central Washington, Western Washington and Saint Martin's University contributed to this report.
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