California State University, Long Beach
Looking toward the northwest, you can see the Pyramid dominates the northern
skyline. This is a very athlete friendly location, I'm sure that is largely
due to the influence of the track coach, Andy Sythe. We run several meets here
each year not including the regular schedule of All-Comer meets. I've always
noted this track is particularly soft. Maybe these are the reasons so many people
train here.
There has been some discussion about horizontally adjustable steeplechase
pits. This is one of them, built during the period of time when women's steeplechase
specified a shorter pit. They stopped specifying the shorter pit when it was
determined it was too difficult for all the tracks of the world to install such
a barrier. So often, races would happen with 12 foot pits just because the proper
facilities were not available (and it was difficult to track what the exact
circumstances of each race realy were). What they did to shorten the pit was
to unbolt the barrier from the plate it is currently connected to and move it
to the plate 2 feet to the left to get a 10 foot length (they also shortened
the barrier to 30" with the bolt on the side). Some other places might
have the barrier mounted into holes (so there will be another set of holes in
front of the normal mark. Adjustable 10 foot pits are rare to find and currently
should not be used--but some people have not gotten the message. Occasional
races still happen with 10 foot pits. If there is ever a question, this is what
to look for.
At the south end of the sprint straight is this short, 2 lane wide, All Weather
ramp to nowhere. I don't have any idea why this exists. Mt. SAC has a similar
ramp away from the track.