More than the Competition: The Sprints Community Within D3 Track & Field

Ruthless. Unforgiving. Cutthroat. These are just a few words people use to describe track and field.

It’s a sport centered around weeding out the best of the best. There can only be one leader or winner at once, except for the rare occasion of ties. Even then, everyone else has to look up to the victors and dream about what they aspire to be. 

It can be difficult to find genuine relationships among coaches and competitors in a sport with scarce resources where everyone is trying to make it.

But through it all, many college athletes have found a way through this harsh and sometimes unforgiving environment. At the Division 3 level, student-athletes have created bonds that transcend the selfish nature of track and field.

Instead of every athlete for themselves, it’s every athlete together working toward a common goal: victory.

How is that possible?

Deyton Love, an All-American hurdler from Wartburg, says it’s through respect.

Photo Credit: Maddie Bahr - Deyton Love before the 400mH

“We’re going to get in these blocks, and it’s gonna be a dog fight,” said Love. “But at the end of the day, we know that they put in a lot of work, and they know we did too.”

Following meets, Love mentioned how opposing teams would message each other through social media and congratulate their competitors. They’d also be excited to race again and wish them luck on their journeys to nationals.

When athletes respect and admire each other, they forget about being angry at each other. They start adopting the mindset that if they lose, the other person just had a better day. But there’s always the opportunity to get them next time. Competition becomes less uptight and more fun.

So, where does this respect come from?

Photo Credit: Maddie Bahr - UW-Lacrosse and Benedictine after the 4x1

Division 3 athletes create this bond through two circumstances: no athletic money and constantly being talked down on as the “slow” division. People understand that if an athlete makes it to the national meet, it's because they put in the work and wanted to be there. With no money held over their heads, nothing is stopping them from leaving.

Additionally, when no one expects D3 athletes to do well, the sky’s the limit when setting goals. Athletes can set the bar as high as they want and gain support from the people around them since many athletes are not shooting for professional contracts and Olympic medals.

You want to see those people succeed since you know they're doing it because they genuinely want to, and they’re beating the odds. Those kinds of athletes are easy to root for. As Love described it, people truly care about you and your story.

“It’s the same way everywhere you go; it’s always supportive,” said Love.

The Wartburg hurdler had a tough season after pulling his hamstring and his father's passing.

“Everyone around me who knew what my journey has been until this point just had my back consistently,” stated Love.

The support from Division 3 athletes runs so deep that some teams develop rivalries that are less about hating each other and more about elevating each other. You can almost think about it as a competition to see who can love the opposing team the most.

Lexi Lefever, a nationally decorated long jumper from Wisconsin River Falls, stated that Wisconsin Stout was their team’s rival. The teams are nearby, and Stout is usually ranked higher than River Falls at their conference championship. Despite this, she described their rivalry as a joyous one.

“We go to all their home meets; they come to our home meets. It’s like a fun rivalry because we bring out the best in each other,” said Lefever.

To paint a picture of this, Lefever talked about the support she got from the Stout athletes.

“I’m the only [woman] long jumper on my team,” said Lefever. “They definitely realized that… so they like to cheer for me, and it’s super nice to see on my end because it’s really supportive of them.”

Even at conference championships, athletes do not feel the need to be angry over what place they got, regardless of the high stakes. At the outdoor WIAC championships this past season, four women in the 100m final ran sub-12. Immediately after seeing the times, the women hugged and high-fived each other because they were proud of how their competitors did. Lefever stated that no one was angry about what place they got at that moment. They were just happy to see such a fast personal best.

Photo Credit: Maddie Bahr - 100m hurdlers congratulate each other after the race

It’s important to understand that it’s not just the athletes who foster the community nature of Division 3 track and field; it’s the coaches too.

While at the 2022 Division 3 Outdoor National Championships, I spoke with Justin Lindsey, the head coach at TCNJ. When we talked about the 400m, he mentioned that this was the time for the All-Atlantic region to band together.

Half of the women who competed in Friday’s 400m preliminaries were from the Atlantic region. In a perfect world, every competitor on the podium could be from the east coast. Even though none of those 11 women attended the same school, coaches and athletes were still thinking about winning as a group.

This went beyond words, though. Coaches actually put this into action.

According to Susan Bansbach, a 5x All-American from the University of Rochester, coaches would host meets centered around qualifying as many athletes as possible for nationals.

“It was [Ithaca], Geneseo, us, and maybe another team, and [the coaches] were all like let’s run a really fast 4x400m to qualify for nationals,” said Bansbach.

Photo Credit: Maddie Bahr - 3rd leg of the 4x4

To create the best environment for this outcome, the coaches of each team agreed to run the 4x400m as the first event instead of the last. Their athletes would be fresh and wouldn’t have the fatigue of other events weighing them down.

Many of the teams in that race ran a season-best and punched their tickets to Greensboro last outdoor season.

When teams band together like this, it recreates the feeling of national-caliber competition. It also creates a sense of a family.

When SUNY Geneseo was initially disqualified in the 4x400m final in Greensboro, Bansbach said she had a heavy heart for them.

“We didn’t know many other teams, [Geneseo] were the people we had been with,” said Bansbach. “Them waiting around to hear if they had won the national title… felt so nerve-racking. We felt exactly what they felt even though we weren’t in the same situation… those are our friends, our people, our region.”

She went on to say that Geneseo was indeed their family, and running with them all season through the pandemic fostered that relationship.

The bonds among athletes are so strong they even last when people transfer. Kevin Danaher, 3x Liberty League champion, was a student at St. Lawrence before using his last season of eligibility at Ithaca College.

Usually, when people transfer, an awkwardness follows if they see their old teammates and coaches again. However, Danaher said that at the Liberty League Conference Championship this year, the St. Lawrence coach waited for almost 20 minutes to congratulate him on winning a conference title.

If you think that is sweet, some of his former teammates drove six and a half hours to SPIRE Institute just to see him compete in his first national championship.

“[I had] such an outpouring support from St. Lawrence people,” said Danaher. “They would say, ‘Hey, we're still rooting for you even if you got a different jersey on’…, and that just solidified the fact for me that Division 3 is where it’s at.”

Division 3 is a model for how high levels of track and field should be. Many fans and athletes act as though running fast and showing love cannot coexist. But it seems D3 has cracked the code to make it work.

When you can be happy for others, you can take your mind off the bad race, jump, or throw that might’ve happened. You can realize that there are many more chances to achieve greatness and quickly get back to focusing on your goal. 

Photo Credit: Maddie Bahr - Jared Storm of Mount Union embracing Rowan after the 4x4

Before you know it, you feel the love you are dishing out. Eventually, it’ll be easy for tough losses to roll off your back, and soon you’ll be in the spot you always dreamed of having.

The reality is that track and field will always be unforgiving and cutthroat. However, it doesn’t need to be that way all the time. It can be just as competitive even if we embrace a more familial nature.

The D3 track and field community shows such a deep love, and I can only hope everyone gets a chance to experience it.