This year, for almost an entire season, many track and field events saw an empty stadium. Take this year’s Grand Slam Track’s inaugural meet, for example. Staged in Kingston, Jamaica, in June, the event was tagged as one of the “poorly-attended,” athletics events. Following this, the question that took the spotlight was whether the presence of athletes like Gabby Thomas and Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone and races like the men’s 1500 and women’s 400 are enough to push track events into the mainstream. However, the 2025 Tokyo World Athletics Championships gave a halt to those questions as it drew 619,288 spectators across nine days, marking a full return of fans to the National Stadium.

Earlier this season, a thletes, including Noah Lyles , reported that empty stands affected motivat

See Full Page