Track and Field Participation Continues to Grow
By Chris Schmidt, Communications Officer | Friday, May 13, 2011 2:21 PM
Blair Severson of Holland High School clears the pole vault bar at the 2011 UIL State Track Meet on the University of Texas at Austin campus. Severson won the 1A championship with a best vault of 15 feet, 6 inches.
Photo by Jeanne Acton
The UIL Track and Field State Meet has completed 100 years of competition and begins its second century of crowning champions this May. As the oldest sanctioned UIL athletic event, track and field has risen from its humble beginnings into one of the largest sports in Texas.
Ninety student-athletes from 11 schools attended the inaugural track and field state meet in 1911. Competitors participated in 14 events at Clark Field on the University of Texas at Austin campus. By comparison, the 2010 UIL Track and Field State Meet hosted more than 500 schools and 1,800 student-athletes competing in 34 total events for boys and girls.
“The passion the whole state has for the sport is amazing,” said Sheila Henderson, UIL Assistant Athletic Director.
Henderson and fellow UIL Assistant Athletic Director Traci Neely are co-directors of the UIL Track and Field State Meet.
“I think the interest in track and field has been passed down through the generations,” Neely said. “Communities embrace those students who are track and field athletes. That’s just carried through to this generation.”
However, participation in track and field has not been immune to difficult times. World events like the Great Depression and World War II had an effect on students and schools in the early years of the state meet.
In 1934 during the Great Depression, the number of participants at the state track meet dropped 53 percent from the previous year. It was the sharpest decline since its inception. In 1943 during World War II, the number of schools participating at the state track meet dropped from 135 to 93.
In 1942, the UIL State Executive Committee reserved the right to alter – even cancel – any activity should the war effort require it, but the state track and field meet was never canceled.
As the war ended, school participation steadily rose, setting a new record for number of schools participating at the state meet in 1950 with 271.
Participation in UIL track and field continued to grow even larger as more opportunities would arise for Texas student-athletes.
The Prairie View Interscholastic League (PVIL), the governing body of extracurricular activities for Texas’ African-American high schools, began to merge with the UIL at the start of the 1967-68 school year. By the time the PVIL fully merged with the UIL in 1970, the state meet set a new record in school participation with 350 high schools competing at the two-day event.
“When PVIL and UIL merged, participation didn’t go down, it went up,” Henderson said. “That meant something significant, and it meant something to them to be able to have that opportunity.”
In 1972, participation in track and field grew as girls’ track and field state champions were crowned for the first time. Girls had competed in county track and field meets since the early 1900s but never in a UIL state meet. More than 250 female student-athletes competed in the first UIL Girls’ Track and Field State Meet, which was held separately from the boys’ state meet.
More opportunities to compete at the state meet became available this year since a ninth qualifier was added in each conference for each boys’ and girls’ event.
“It’s a combination of talent and everything to go right in your season, plus luck to be able to get to the state meet,” Neely said. “That one extra qualifier has given them hope that they can get to state. It’s renewed people in a way that they know track and field is still evolving.”
The UIL Track and Field State Meet has seen thousands of competitors come through Austin with the goal of becoming state champion. Even after 100 years of competition the sport continues to grow and evolve, creating new opportunities for Texas student-athletes to compete.
For 2011 results, go to: http://www.uiltexas.org/track-field/state/results.