The latest weather reports call for a very hot and humid day. The heat index will be over 100 at times and the temperatures will not drop into the 80s till the end of the meet. The meet management will try its best to keep the athletes as safe and cool as possible. We will be providing water, wet sponge & towel buckets, and trainer & volunteer assistance to athletes following events. However, it is always good for the athletes themselves to take the precautions themselves to prevent any incidents such as coming with plenty of water and gatorade to drink, shade cover from the sun (umbrellas, tents, hats, sunblock, etc). This meet will move along as planned with the high jump starting at 2 PM, the rest of the field events at 3 PM, and the running events at 5PM. We estimate that the running events with over 450 athletes in the meet will take anywhere from 5 hours to 5 1/2 hours to be run off with the All-Star boys DMR finishing the meet at 10:15 PM.
Other things to remember:
- USATF Sanctioned Meet & USATF Rules - The Gala is a USATF sanctioned meet, so be aware that some of the rules are different than the rules we work under in the regular season for high school. For example in USATF sanctioned event, a first false start is charged to the field and second false started is charged to the athlete who committed the false start and is then disqualified. Read up on the USATF rules here: http://www.usatf.org/about/rules/2008/
- Parking - $3 parking fee. There is a Richmond Braves game on Saturday and they control the parking lots next to Sports Backers Stadium. They will have attendanants out at noon time, so even though the game is at 7PM, arriving early will not keep you from avoiding the parking fee. None of this money is collected by meet management as even officials will have to pay to get in, but please be courteous to the parking attendants and plan accordingly to pay the $3 parking fee.
- Throws Weigh-Ins - Certification of shot and discus will start at 2 PM in the track shed beyond the finish line area.
- Athlete Check-In - All athletes will be required to check upon arriving to the stadium at the athletes & coaches only gate near the clerking and concession stand area (behind the start of the 100). Athletes will be given a wrist band to be worn at all times especially when leaving the facility for warmup and re-entering back through the athlete gate.
- Entry Fees - Coaches and athletes who have yet to pay their entry fee can do so at the athlete gate near the clerking and concession stand area (behind the start of the 100). You don't pay your entry fee, you don't compete!
- Tee Shirts - Tee shirts will be sold at the meet with a vender printing shirts on-shirt.
- MileStat.com Subscriptions & Donations Table - There will be a table in which attendees can purchase discounted subscriptions to MileStat.com of $20 ($5 off) as well as make any donations if they wish to helping support this website.
- DMR Relay Batons - Relay batons will be furnished for the All-Star DMR teams, but school teams will need to furnish their own.
- Field Events Flights - The long jump and triple jump for both boys and girls will have two flights going from worst to best. Each athlete will get three attempts in their flight. Top 8 athletes from preliminary flights will advance onto the finals where they will get three more attempts. In the throwing events, there will be one single flight where athletes will get three attempts to qualify for a finals of 8 athletes with the best marks after three attempts where they will get an additional three more throws in the finals.