The Director's Cut

Millrose Games' meet director Ray Flynn was recently interviewed by Peter Gambaccini of Runner's World and below are some of the insights he shared.

On becoming the meet director for the Millrose Games:

"In the spring sometime, I had a call from Dr. Norb Sander (Executive Director of the Armory Foundation) and he asked me would I be interested in being the meet director for the Millrose Games. I thought about it for awhile and I said, 'yes.' I believe in the Millrose Games. I'm honored to have been part of some of the great races in my career in the Millrose Games and in the Wanamaker mile."

On the changing face of professional indoor track:

"I think the sport in general has changed, and indoor running has changed. In my day, there were 20 prominent meets in the indoor season. Mass racing (ie, on the roads) was not popular then like it is today. Our sport is continually going through a transition. So the way I see it is that we need to make the indoor meets the best that we can make them, and the athletes love the fast tracks."

On the athletes embracing The Armory:

"I think the move to the Armory is warranted. So many of the athletes now grew up on that (Armory) track, athletes like Sanya Richards-Ross – "oh my God, I want to run in the Armory, I love running there, I set the record there." So I feel like it's a natural move."

On the expectations of the 2012 Millrose Games:

"We are expected to have 5,000 people in the Armory. There's new seating being built. I was there last week, and it's very impressive. It's going to look great. Tickets sales are very strong. And the Millrose trials for the high school sections are just now beginning. We're expecting a big bump in sales. We haven't even announced most of our fields yet."

On Flynn's own relationship with The Armory:

"I feel like I'm fortunate to work with the Armory. They have a great infrastructure. They're staging 50-plus competitions a year there. They have people on the ground there who are experienced, like Jack Pfeifer, people who are there every day. It makes my life a lot easier. I'm not putting on a meet where it hasn't been before or it's in another city and the people executing the meet don't live there, which actually happens a lot in this sport. These people actually live there, they run meets all the time, and okay, I'm the meet director, but I have a great team to work with."

Please click here for the full interview.