Project Oversight: Wind direction

Often times something seems very obvious to one person but needs to be pointed out to others not familiar with their methods of operation. Even the obvious questions need to be asked when planning and designing a project. Everyone involved should have the same expectations for the completed project.

During the time I was striping tracks with Sport Build/California Track and Engineering, we would come into new athletic stadiums to put the final markings on the track. Typically, we would speak with the track coach and see if there are any special requests.

One high school track on the coast in Southern California, I remember the coach quite well. We found the head coach out on the track and we introduced ourselves to him. The first words out if his mouth were, “I have been coaching here 30 years, I finally get an all-weather track and I want to quit”. The coach went on to explain how the track finished into the headwinds off the coast during the spring season and no one even consulted him about it.

Another major oversight was putting the runway and box for the pole vault too close to the inside lane of the track. Once the pole vault pits arrived and were put in place, the back corner of the landing pit stuck out more than a foot into lane 1. The pole vault can easily take several hours to complete a competition. This would require that the pole vault be held at a different time than all the running events, a different day or a different site.

Oversights like this can cost a great deal of money to correct or if simply left as is can have a detrimental effect on the track and field program.