Penn Relays to host an April 24 track and field meet featuring 15 to 20 local schools

The Philadelphia Metropolitan Intercollegiate meet will take place at Franklin Field on what was to be the final day of the 126th carnival, which was canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

From left, Penn's Nia Akins, Melissa Tanaka, Uchechi Nwogwugwu, and Maddie Villalba celebrate winning the college women's distance medley championship during the 125th annual Penn Relays at Franklin Field in Philadelphia on Thursday, April 25, 2019. The carnival was canceled for the second straight year, but a smaller track and field meet will be conducted at Franklin Field on April 24.Read moreTIM TAI / Staff Photographer

by Joe Juliano

Published March 29, 2021, 4:54 p.m. ET

While the Penn Relays will not be conducted for a second straight year due to the coronavirus pandemic, carnival officials are preparing to host the Philadelphia Metropolitan Intercollegiate, a small track and field meet for about 15 to 20 local schools, on April 24 at Franklin Field.

Penn Relays director Dave Johnson said Monday that the Philadelphia “Mets,” a revival of the collegiate meet that ran annually from 1963 through 1987, mostly at Franklin Field, will feature all the Big 5 universities plus Delaware and Rider, along with Division II and Division III schools and junior colleges.

“We’re trying to do something to stay actively engaged with the track community and support the track community in whatever way we can,” Johnson said. “Our radius of schools allowable is about 40 miles, so it’s very much Delaware Valley schools. It’s a commuting meet – one day, no spectators.”

Penn’s Division of Recreation and Intercollegiate Athletics announced Thursday that it had been approved for its spring sports teams to conduct competition locally. The Ivy League had not allowed for any outside activities among its athletic programs since the onset of the pandemic last March.

Spring sports competition for the Quakers began on Saturday.

The Philadelphia Mets will be held on what would have been the final day of the 126th Penn Relays, the nation’s oldest and largest event of its kind, which would be welcoming around 15,000 athletes and more than 110,000 spectators.

While the meet will be much, much smaller, Johnson plans to conduct a significant percentage of events that would usually be performed at the carnival.

“We’ll combine sort of the Thursday night distance races with a regular track meet,” he said. “We’ll run four or five relays depending on the number of schools that enter – the 4x1, 4x4, 4x8, and either or both of the medley relays, both men and women.

“Then on the running events, we’re going to try to run both hurdles, the 1,500, the steeplechase, the 5,000 and the 10,000, then all the field events – throwing events on the outside fields, jumping events in the stadium.”

The Philadelphia Mets will be the fourth track and field event conducted at Franklin Field in a four-week span. The first, the Penn Challenge, took place on Saturday.

“The coaches are eager for it,” Johnson said. “They’re just champing at the bit to get going, and they have similar restrictions from different schools. Some of them can travel, some can’t. But everybody’s budgets are certainly affected dramatically so that anything we can do for the local community and keep the meet local is good.”