Mile News


Local race aiming to bring the Mile back into spotlight

July 31, 2014

GNC Live Well Liberty Mile attracts top U.S. field including Leo Manzano and defending champion Heather Kampf

By Alex Nieves, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Steve Prefontaine, Roger Bannister, Mary Decker. If you were to stop an adult on the streets of an American city, these names would likely invoke at least a hazy image of past fame and athletic prowess.

But for many Americans the sport of track & field does not hold the same allure it did a few decades ago.

By the mid-1980s, tracks around the country had switched from yards to meters, and the most iconic of the American races, the Mile, had lost its place in the athletic landscape.

For the third year in a row, Pittsburgh Three Rivers Marathon Inc. and Bring Back the Mile, a campaign dedicated to reviving the Mile, will be the host of the GNC Live Well Liberty Mile in Downtown Pittsburgh, part of a continued push to increase the popularity of the storied Mile race.

The event, which starts at 7:00pm Friday, will bring together some of the top American distance runners and Western Pennsylvanians of all ages in an effort to introduce more people to the Mile and to give professional runners another venue to compete against high-level competition.

“Our goal with Bring Back the Mile is to further raise the profile of and celebrate the Mile, the present and the past,” said campaign founder Ryan Lamppa, of Santa Barbara, Calif.

Continue reading at: www.post-gazette.com

Tags: ryan lamppa (110) , gnc live well liberty mile (69) , bbtm news (207)

Facebook Comments

Return the Mile to prominence on the American & worldwide sports and cultural landscape by elevating and celebrating the Mile to create a movement.

ELEVATE
Bring Back the Mile as the premier event in the sport, and increase interest in and media coverage of the Mile for both those who love the distance as well as the general public.

CELEBRATE
Bring Back the Mile to celebrate the storied distance and to recognize the people who made and make the Mile great and to promote Mile events and the next generation of U.S. Milers.

NATIONAL MOVEMENT
Bring Back the Mile to create a national movement for the Mile as America’s Distance,
to inspire Americans to run the Mile as part of their fitness program and to replace the 1600 meters at High School State Track & Field Meets across the country.

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