The No. 1 question in masters track is: Where can I compete? The answer to that simple query tells a lot about the state of our sport. If you ask Andy Hecker of Southern California, he’ll tell you that USATF is doing a terrible job satisfying that simple inquiry. Andy writes: “For my four decades in this sport, we in this sport have had a terrible habit of holding our events in secrecy. I started posting this (all-comers) list 13 years ago to try to improve that situation — and have failed. The tide is simply too strong.” But he’s not giving up. His site continues to point masters nationwide to hundreds of meets a year.

Andy writes:

This summer’s update to the North American All Comers Meet Directory, posted at http://www.trackinfo.org, is well along the way. This is my own labor to try to compile listings of track meets that are open to participation by unaffiliated athletes — a complicated definition to describe people, including most Masters, who do not have a program of events laid out for their participation.
In the same respect, I avoid Youth, High School and Collegiate meets because those (team oriented) groups do a good job of finding meets for their athletes to participate in.
I will continue to update this list as I get new information. I welcome information I don’t know.
For my four decades in this sport, we in this sport have had a terrible habit of holding our events in secrecy. I started posting this list 13 years ago to try to improve that situation–and have failed. The tide is simply too strong.
I am confounded — questioning what personality defect is epidemic amongst Track and Field meet organizers. As our sport slowly falls out of public consciousness . . . we continue to shoot ourselves in the foot by outrageously bad publicity.
Gelling it down, there is a simple amount of information people want to have before they will make the effort to travel to a track meet to participate.
1) That the event exists (or at least that the organizers had the serious intent to hold the event–we all know last minute things happen).
2) That their entry will be welcome.
2a) Under what circumstances (age, entry deadline, qualifying standards?)
3) Where is the event?
4) When is the event?
5) How much does it cost?
At this point in history, having a web page with information about ANY intended public event should be expected. That page should include the above information, preferably in an easy to read form. The technology to do this is not beyond anybody capable of organizing a meet — somebody in your group must have the knowledge and the means to accomplish such a simple/necessary task.
I’ll go a step further to suggest that there should be a central repository to search and find these sites — a Google for track meets, as it were.
You’d think USATF.org would be the logical place for this, but they don’t post meets that are not sanctioned.
Many of these small, grass-roots meets don’t have the interest or budget to get sanction (including the 18-meet Los Angeles summer series), so they don’t show up on the USATF site. Some of the worst offenders at NOT posting the necessary information are USATF meets. Believe me, and I have said this before, I would love to turn this job over to a professional website/organization. If only such a professional organization could be found.
It seems so simple. I am shocked at how hard it is to find this basic information. I have seen all manner of a hodgepodge of confusing, incomplete or outdated sites, incorrect links, a variety of files and formats that would challenge the perseverance of most potential participants.
In the commercial world (if these events were intent on making money) these potential participants are CUSTOMERS.
Meet directors, please get your act together. If you can’t find anybody to create and/or host such a simple web page, feel free to write me at info@trackinfo.org.

Andy is spot-on, of course. But meet directors should throw a wide net when publicizing their events. So in addition to sending Andy their meet info, they are welcome to post meet information on our Forum. It’s free, easy and allows for instant feedback. Occasionally, meet directors send info straight to me, asking that I mention their meets on my blog. That’s fine. But I don’t have time to do this in every instance.
Posting to the Forum is advised. And getting listed on Andy’s site.
Just do it.