The track and field world is shaking, and it’s not just from incredible sprints. Everyone’s talking about Michael Johnson’s Grand Slam Track league being canceled. It was supposed to be this big, bold idea to bring more money and excitement to the sport. But folded in its last leg of the season, all reportedly because of money troubles. This really highlights a tough truth: even though track and field shines at the Olympics, it’s seriously struggling financially, and that’s holding it back. It makes you wonder, how can a sport with so much talent be so broke?
Enter Tara Davis-Woodhall, the Olympic gold medalist whose energy is just contagious when she’s doing the long jump. In a recent “A Touch More” Live Podcast YouTube video, Tara got real about the sport’s biggest problem: it’s incredibly hard to actually watch it. “It’s so difficult to watch. It’s not on television, and it doesn’t have its own network,” she said, and you could hear the frustration in her voice.
She specifically called out the Diamond League, which is like the sport’s big-time circuit with 12 meets every year, full of history and the best athletes, “You have to go watch our Diamond League, which is the biggest league in all of track and field right now, you have to watch it on another streaming platform called FloTrack.”, you can’t just turn on TV to see it. Instead, you have to subscribe to FloTrack, which is a streaming service. Why should fans pay extra for a sport that’s already fighting for their attention?
Tara isn’t just complaining; she’s revealing a real crisis. “There’s no one that really knows what FloTrack is,” she admitted. “You have to pay for it, obviously, but like we’re already paying for so many streaming services as is, and putting another one just for track—that’s a hard thing to come by.” Even as an athlete, she struggles with the cost. With everyone already juggling Netflix, Hulu, and all the rest, another paywall feels like an impossible hurdle. This lack of access, Tara argues, is really stifling the sport’s growth. How can track and field get bigger if no one can even see it?
All these financial troubles, from the Grand Slam’s failure to the lack of sponsorships, are directly tied to this visibility problem. Tara’s plea is a huge wake-up call: we need to make the sport easy for everyone to watch. Will the leaders of track and field listen, or will the sport keep running in circles, hidden behind more paywalls?
Tara complains about the prohibition of taking videos on tracks
Well, Tara Davis-Woodhall is just plain fed up. She’s tired of the sport’s most electrifying moments, like her incredible soaring leaps, rarely making it onto fans’ screens. And she’s not shy about pointing fingers at the strict video rules that are making it happen. “It’s really hard to find clips of track and field,” Tara said during a frank discussion at Variety’s Sports Culture Happy Hour at Cannes Lions in June 2025. With major meets like the Diamond League often hidden behind paywalls and filming usually restricted, the whole sport feels like it’s being kept a secret. It begs the question: Why can’t fans easily see the magic?
To combat this, Tara and her husband, Hunter Woodhall, have decided to take matters into their own hands. “So we have to bring our videographers to come film and actually make my and Hunter’s jumps and running a little bit more sexy,” she explained. Their mission? To create slick, shareable content that will pop on social media and grab the attention of people who aren’t necessarily obsessed with split times. But here’s the kicker: many meets, including the Stockholm Diamond League, where Tara tied a record in 2025, actually discourage or even outright ban this kind of personal filming. It makes you wonder, why should athletes have to sneak cameras in just to show off their sport?
Tara believes these restrictions are seriously stifling the sport’s growth. Her videos are doing exactly what track and field needs: making it accessible and turning casual viewers into passionate fans. So, the big question remains: Will track and field finally loosen its grip and let its stars shine, or will it continue to keep their brilliance under wraps?
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