Nitro Athletics

Nitro Athletics was a track and field series featuring multi-day meetings between teams of twelve athletes. The teams contained both men and women and also para-athletics competitors. There are both national and international teams. The events contested were a mix of Olympic-standard events and variations on common athletics events.[1]

Nitro Athletics
Current season, competition or edition:
2017 Nitro Athletics
SportAthletics
Founded2017
Official websiteNitro Athletics.com.au

The series was created by former athlete John Steffensen and Athletics Australia (AA). The president of the AA, Mark Arbib, stated his interest in creating a novel competition was the result of his seeing dwindling interest in traditional one-day track and field meetings, citing in particular low crowds he saw at the 2015 Sydney Track Classic.[2] The sport's leading star, Usain Bolt, was recruited as a co-investor and performer of the series. Despite breaking from the standard setup of athletics competitions, the series was supported by Sebastian Coe, head of the International Association of Athletics Federations.[3][4]

The series was hosted at Lakeside Stadium in Melbourne over three separate days (4, 9, 11 February).[5] The six teams to feature were New Zealand, Australia, England, China, Japan and the Bolt All-Stars (a mix of athletes from the Americas and Africa).[6][7][8] The events attracted near-capacity crowds of the 8,000 seat arena and was broadcast on live television across many of the competing nations.[2]

Generalist media gave a positive response to the event, with the Herald Sun describing it as a "raging success".[9] The reaction from specialist media was more mixed, however, with Athletics Weekly saying the ideas "have been tried before. Nitro Athletics has merely thrown them all into one meeting".[10]

Athletics Australia announced that the planned 2018 series would not be held due to calendar constraints related to the Commonwealth Games being held on the Gold Coast in April.

Events
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See also
  • IAAF Diamond League

References
  1. Nitro Athletics: Usain Bolt All-Stars team to face England in 'revolutionary' meet. BBC Sport (2 February 2017). Retrieved on 2017-02-13.
  2. Nitro goes off with a bang, returning crowds to athletics. The Australian (13 February 2017). Retrieved on 2017-02-13.
  3. Coe sold on the Nitro Athletics concept. The Australian (11 February 2017). Retrieved on 2017-02-13.
  4. Clean sweep for Bolt All-Stars at Nitro Athletics meet in Melbourne. Jamaica Gleaner (11 February 2017). Retrieved on 2017-02-13.
  5. Bolt launches Nitro Athletics in Melbourne . IAAF (4 November 2016). Retrieved on 2017-02-13.
  6. NITRO Athletics – 4/02/2017 Archived 5 February 2017 at the Wayback Machine. Nitro Athletics. Retrieved on 13 February 2017.
  7. NITRO Athletics Melbourne – 9/02/2017. Nitro Athletics. Retrieved on 13 February 2017.
  8. NITRO Athletics Final Melbourne – 11/02/2017. Nitro Athletics. Retrieved on 13 February 2017.
  9. Gullen, Scott (12 February 2017). Aussie teen’s incredible showing encapsulates everything we love about Nitro Athletics. Herald Sun. Retrieved on 2017-02-13.
  10. Henderson, Jason (10 February 2017). Nitro Athletics fails to explode. Athletics Weekly. Retrieved on 2017-02-13.
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