As the sun sets on the first edition of British Athletics’ latest meet, the Keely Klassic, we can take a look back to see if the event was actually a success, or did it fail to reach the expectations of fans and organisers.  

Firstly, it’s clear to see that the Keely Klassic tried something new and with anything new comes uncertainty and risk. The event, held in the Utilita Arena in Birmingham, consisted of a number of national and international races and field events. Within these events there were a number of Britian’s best on show, with the likes of Molly Caudery, Neil Gourley and Georgia Bell all taking part. However, this may highlight the first flaw of the meet, as the strength in depth of each race or field event was quite poor. With the British Indoor Championships being held next week, many athletes were most likely prioritizing that instead of this. This led to races where it felt the winner was already decided, with only a small number of athletes travelling from abroad. If you were to make a comparison with the line-ups for the British Championships next week there is a significant difference in the number of athletes that have actually represented Britian in major championships.  

In terms of trying something new, the Keely Klassic opted for a much more light-hearted approach to athletics, with large amounts of the schedule specifically taken to playing music and dancing. This somewhat represents Keely Hodgkinson’s fun personality. And really this is just a personal preference on if you like this or not. There were large amounts of children at the event on Saturday and many of them seemed to enjoy the dancing sessions, however for hardcore fans of athletics, perhaps of the older section of the crowd, this may not have been what they were hoping for from an athletics event. Also, this style of meet doesn’t lend itself well to mainstream television coverage, as I doubt many people will want to watch others dancing on the TV. Maybe I’m wrong though. Really this is for you to decide on your opinion – should athletics lean more into this sort of entertainment or is the actual athletics enough to get crowds engaged?  

Speaking of crowds, one concern organisers and sponsors may have about the event was the attendance. British Atheltcis are currently performing very well in terms of crowd numbers for their big meets, especially the Diamond League event that takes place in London every July. The London Stadium has had a 60,000 capacity sold out for the last two years. Therefore, there might’ve been a bit of shock when only half of the arena was filled, which only has a 15,000 capacity in comparison. This may lean quite heavily into the high ticket prices. For a family of four the cheapest tickets came to £90 . These prices are quite a jump compared to other indoor athletics meetings, especially with the level of athletics on show, as this was not a World Championships or European Championships. Other reasons may be that the British Championships is next weekend, and people could only afford to one and chose that, we will see on the weekend through the attendance to that. Either way, I doubt British Athletics were particularly pleased with the amount of people that came to the first ever Keely Klassic.  

Now we need to talk about the elephant in the room and that is the woman herself, Keely Hodgkinson. First things first, the Olympic 800 metre champion deserves some praise because it wouldn’t have been easy watching other people competing at you event and you can’t even run yourself. She stayed the whole day, interacting with the crowd and supporting fellow athletes in their pursuits for records and times. However, after the news of Hodgkinson’s injury just days before the event, it poses the question, should whole meets be centred around one athlete for this very reason? Keely not being able to race wouldn’t have effected tickets for this year’s event due to how late the announcement was, although next years ticket sales could be put in jeopardy because of it. The whole event did feel a little overshadowed by the fact that the star of the show couldn’t even compete. Another topic for you to have your own opinion on.  

But it is definitely not all doom and gloom for the Keely Klassic. The biggest positive to take out of the first edition of the event was the amount of young people there were in attendance, getting involved and enjoying the athletics. Also, there were under 17 races from the local clubs, giving kids an idea of what the support is all about. And that was one of the things Hodgkinson aimed for when setting up this event, getting more children watching and enjoying athletics, which is definitely did. Now let’s hope that Britian’s next set of Olympians continue the legacy that Keely enhanced through her event.  

Some great highlights of the Keely Klassic this weekend, with plenty to work on too for British Athletics. The question is, should it happen again next year? That’s for you to decide