Simply after 10 p.m. on Thursday evening, a crowd gathered on the monitor at Icahn Stadium in New York Metropolis. As lights began pulsing throughout the stage set on the infield, three teenage ladies behind me screamed and ran towards it simply as Megan Thee Stallion appeared. Her set closed out Athlos NYC, the ladies’s-only monitor meet boasting the best prize purse within the sport.
Most monitor meets don’t finish with a efficiency from a Grammy Award–successful artist. However Athlos isn’t your typical monitor meet. It felt extra like a extremely produced present, from pyrotechnics through the athlete walk-outs, to light-up bracelets that blinked in rhythm with DJ D-Good’s set, to bestowing the successful runners with a Tiffany crown. Pink and magenta lights flashed across the perimeter of the monitor. A VIP part with black couches and high-top tables lined the entrance of the grandstand the place celebrities and monitor and subject royalty mingled.
And that was the purpose. “Usually, monitor meets are all about monitor. They’re all about sitting in your seat and watching a race. That is about celebrating monitor, celebrating the runners,” three-time Olympic gold medalist Gabby Thomas, stated throughout a huddle with press the day earlier than the race.
The idea is easy—showcase girls athletes. Thirty-six of the quickest girls (with 30 Olympic medals amongst them). Customized mini bibs that match the ladies’s torsos slightly than the standard outsized ones. Six races (starting from 100m to 1500m). Huge prize cash and revenue-sharing alternatives. (The winner of every race netted $60,000, twice what was paid to the winner of the Diamond League Finals. Second place earned $25,000, whereas $10,000 was awarded for third, $8,000 for fourth, $5,000 for fifth, and $2,500 for sixth!)
The meet is the brainchild of Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian (husband to Serena Williams). After speaking to a variety of runners, together with Thomas, he noticed untapped potential and undervalued athletes. “Of us have been making choices primarily based on legacy media offers and what they suppose folks need,” Ohanian informed SELF forward of the occasion. “However you miss out on a ton of different storytelling since you’re not attending to the why. You’re not stepping into extra depth concerning the athletes, the people themselves.”