The Georgia High School Association moved the start date for spring sports in the 2024-25 school year to Jan. 27, 19 days later than the start date for the 2023-24 season. This limits the dates teams, particularly track and field, can prepare for the season with equipment like hurdles and high jump bars.
GHSA Executive Director Tim Scott said the change was due to smaller schools that have athletes compete in both spring and winter sports. These players cannot practice or play in their spring sports until the winter season is over.
“A lot of smaller schools that only have 300-500 students are trying to play the same sports as [bigger schools] are trying to play,” Scott said. “We tried to come up with a universal date where we could get through some of the Winter sports before the Spring sports started. Even though we pushed the start date back a few weeks, the number of contests are still being played that they’ve always played.”
Matt Henson, the coach at Parkview and the president of the National High School Track & Field and Cross Country Association, said that he has had experience with transitioning winter athletes to spring sports and his teams waited for those athletes to make the transition.
“When I first came to Georgia from North Carolina in 2002, we were starting at the end of January, and we started track practice in late February,” Henson said. “We waited about three weeks because of basketball. We were in the final four every year, and we did get a lot of those kids.”
Heritage girls track and field coach Russell Thomas said he supports the change in the start date, as it will allow the school’s winter sports players to miss less of the season and allow the weather to get warmer.
“Basketball lasts long, and if you go to a school that makes it deep into the playoffs, you’re not going to get them until later,” Thomas said.
Although the first practice dates were moved back by nearly three weeks from last year, the first competition date was moved back by only five days from last year to Feb 10. Bryce Doe, the head track coach at North Atlanta, said the shorter time from first practice to first meet has forced him to alter his plan for training and tryouts before the season’s start.
“I am absolutely opposed to it,” Doe said. “I wish it stayed where it was. It doesn’t give us time to get prepared for the season. The start date for the [first meet] didn’t change by much. We are starting on Jan. 27, and our first meet is on Feb. 12. That’s two and a half weeks to get ready for a track meet. Now, I’m going to give kids one week to make the team, when typically I would give kids two weeks to try out and give a little time to get running legs under them before the team time trial.”
Henson believes the season was too long to begin with and the new schedule fits better with his implementation of training cycles.
“Our more advanced kids don’t typically compete in more than six or seven track meets because it’s the way it fits our training cycles,” Henson said. “I’m in support of the change because I feel like track season is already long, and it’s a long training season to get a kid to peak at the right time.”
Marietta head coach Nick Houstoulakis said that the shortened time poses risks to athletes that don’t get the appropriate training time with the team early in the season.
“As a track coach, you have to do things differently,” Houstoulakis said. “You can’t just throw kids in. The first day for competition is rather close to the start of track season. Kids can get hurt if they’re not trained properly in cold weather early on in February and you just start competing hardcore outdoors. You’re going to see an increase in injuries. If you’re not careful, you can really injure a kid early and end their season early. So from that standpoint, coaches have to be more cautious early on and slowplay it.”
GHSA allows one indoor meet for track and field teams every year, which won’t count toward the 10 meets allowed per athlete, as long as it is after the official practice start date. The change of start date to Jan. 27 moves the start date after all eligible indoor meets, meaning Georgia teams cannot participate in indoor meets this year.
Langston Hughes track coach Kevin Foster said this new change is impactful as indoor meets are a significant part of the beginning of the season for his team.
“Football is allowed to play a scrimmage game before the season starts,” Foster said. “All the other sports too are allowed to play a scrimmage game. Whereas, with this indoor meet, a lot of coaches use that as our version of a scrimmage before you get into your actual regular season, so you can have an idea of how your kids are going to do in a competitive setting.”
Thomas said losing indoor meets isn’t an issue for schools with smaller athletic programs, like Heritage, which don’t participate in out-of-state indoor meets.
“I think it really doesn’t affect me because we don’t have an official indoor season here in Georgia,” Thomas said. “A lot of coaches go to indoor meets just because they can, but then, you’ve got schools like me which are small and don’t really have the numbers to do it, so it really doesn’t affect me. I’ve never been a big indoor guy.”
Keith Whatley, the boys coach at South Atlanta, said he believes even the original start date at the beginning of January was too late. He believes the training time provided now leaves minimal time for runners to be in shape for the season to begin.
“Some teams may want to do indoor meets and now there’s just no more prep time,” Portis said. “It takes almost two months to get in half the shape that you need. To be a sprinter, you have to be in the shape to sprint. You can’t rush that because you run the risk of injury. The biggest injury is the hamstring. The hamstring muscle has to be in the optimal shape. You can’t rush that. Even a naturally fast kid will injure themselves because they don’t have the proper time to train.”
KIPP coach Jerry Kossoff said this makes a big difference in the time that developing JV athletes have to practice with the team during the season.
“It can also be tough if you are a junior varsity athlete,” Kossoff said. “There really aren’t many JV meets after spring break, so they really have a pretty short window in which to compete and get better, so losing some of that conditioning time can hurt the development of some of the younger athletes that won’t be competing in regions, sectionals, and states after spring break.”
Midtown athletic director and girls soccer head coach Blair Barksdale said she supports the change because it will allow athletes coming from basketball to miss fewer games than in previous years.
“I think it was the right move because we have so much overlap between winter sports and spring sports,” Barksdale said. “Pushing the season back to the end of January so there’s only a few weeks potentially that you don’t have those athletes, so I think it was the right move.”
Senior Cate Barton starts on both the girls basketball and girls soccer teams, along with running on the track team. She said the change is helpful to a certain degree, but also has some disadvantages.
“As an individual, it definitely benefits me because it leads me to not miss as much of the soccer and track seasons,” Barton said. “But, I can see it being frustrating for coaches and others who don’t participate in other sports because they have less real practice time.”
Foster said he also opposes the change due to the loss of practice time for hurdlers and other technical events.
“In our sport of track and field, you can’t rush conditioning or rush trying to get people into shape in a two-week period,” Foster said. “It also takes away from us being able to prepare our kids, especially those doing technical events like hurdles and high jump, which require additional special preparation. My main concern is having an opportunity to prepare our kids so they can compete at their best abilities.”
Midtown girls track head coach Joshua Washington said both sides of the argument have validity.
“On one side, I do see the benefits of it. The weather will be kinda warmer by that point. If you have athletes that do other sports, you give them an opportunity to fully join the team [earlier],” Washington said. “On the back end of it though, if you look at how late the start date is, versus when the first meets begin, it doesn’t give you too much time to prepare. There are certain things within the GHSA laws and regulations that you cannot do during conditioning and that includes things like working on hurdles, relays or starting blocks. If we wait until Jan. 27, it’s going to be way too late to be prepared to compete in those events competitively by that time, so I think it’s kind of late.”
