Colonial League and LVC join forces

Goodbye, Bangor Memorial Park. Hello, Whitehall Sports Complex.

That is what the Colonial League is saying this year in regards to the location of its track championships.

The Colonial League has decided to try something new and will join up with the Lehigh Valley Conference to host their respective track championships together in the spring of 2012. The championships will be a two-day event, mirroring the District 11 championship schedule, and will be run on May 8th and 9th at Whitehall.

According to Northern Lehigh Athletic Director Brian Geist, it is something the Colonial League has wanted to do for quite some time.

"The Colonial League has always wanted to have a two day event," said Geist. "We also wanted to be on the same track as the District 11 championships to give our athletes as much familiarity with the venue as possible. This allows us to do both.

"Whitehall's Athletic Director and Lehigh Valley Track and Field Chair, Bob Hartman, came to us and asked if we were interested. We agreed it would be beneficial to both parties."

The two day event will run almost exactly like the district championships. However, instead of district classes, there will be leagues. The 'AA' class on the schedule will represent the Colonial League, while the 'AAA' class will represent the Lehigh Valley Conference. The preliminary schedule has the events starting at 3 p.m. and ending somewhere around 8:30 p.m.

Another bonus of competing at the Whitehall Sports Complex is the fact that the venue has two sand pits. That way the schedule can allow for two long jumps and two triples jumps to take place at the same time - two events that take up quite some time at a single-pit location.

Those weren't the only advantages according to Geist.

"The Lehigh Valley was interested in using the automatic timing software that we have, so that kind of got the ball rolling," Geist said. "It also showed to be more cost effective, as it would require less travel for most of the teams.

"As for the athletes and coaches, it allows the distance runners to compete in more events. Everything isn't jam packed into one day. Now that they know the schedule ahead of time, it will allow the athletes and coaches to better plan their day. It should also help them prepare for the District 11 and PIAA schedules since they are very similar."

The District 11 championships will be held a week later at the same location. Geist believes the prior experience at the same track should help the league's athletes better prepare for districts.

While this is the first time the two leagues will combine forces, it is definitely something that may continue to happen in the future. For now though, they will have to see how it goes.

"We can't reflect totally on the revenue generated," said Geist. "We hope it is similar to how we have been doing, but there has been some decline in all sports. However, the fact that it proved to be more cost effective made it seem like a sounder move. Looking at it beforehand, there seems to be a strong possibility that we will do this again in the future. Still, there are questions about some things and we will have to see how they turn out.

"Money isn't the determining factor. Our main focus was to help our athletes and coaches out as much as possible and we believe this does that. The fact that everyone can save some money just helped the process along."