Grand Slam Track, the debt-ridden startup led by Michael Johnson, promised athletes last month that it would pay the first tranche of prize money it owed by the end of July.
It has missed that deadline. Athletes are seeking just over $3 million that they were promised from Grand Slam’s debut event in Kingston, Jamaica in April.
Three agents for athletes who won prize money in Jamaica told Front Office Sports that instead of payments expected by Thursday’s deadline, they received an email.
Grand Slam lured in many of the world’s best athletes with promises of significant prize money: $100,000 for the winner of its two-race Slams, $50,000 for second, down to $10,000 for eighth place. (Some athletes also separately signed contracts that paid them salaries.) But that money has not been paid; only the appearance fees for the Kingston event have been paid so far, a source confirmed to FOS on Thursday.
All told, Grand Slam owes athletes at least $13 million in prize money and appearance fees from its three events in Kingston, Philadelphia, and Miami. None of the prize money or appearance fees from the Philadelphia or Miami meets have been paid, and the league has said it would honor the appearance fees from the Los Angeles meet. It canceled its fourth event in Los Angeles after what Johnson eventually admitted to FOS was a cash crunch caused by an investor pulling out of an eight-figure commitment.
“Our plan is to make payments for Kingston prize money before the end of July and the remaining payments due by the end of September, which includes the honoring of Los Angeles appearance fees,” the league told agents at the beginning of the month. It is now pushing back that deadline.
“Grand Slam Track is anticipating investor funds to hit our account imminently, and the athletes are our top priority,” the league told FOS in a statement Thursday.
“Once these funds are received on our end, we will work to immediately process them to the athletes, noting all banks have different timelines for receiving and depositing funds into individual accounts.
“We are in the process of recapitalizing the company, and we are committed to distributing funds to athletes as soon as we receive them. As we continue to receive funds in the upcoming months, we will distribute payments as they come in. We will continue making progress toward completing full payments at the earliest date possible.”
Johnson told FOS in an interview last week that he was working to fill the gap caused by the unexpected shortfall. The league had launched with $30 million in “commitments” from investors.
“We’ve been working very hard over the last couple of months to make sure that we can get everyone taken care of and making sure that we can actually get to next season,” Johnson said.
A league spokesperson told FOS that though no payment had been made yet Thursday, “Funds are coming imminently, and will be immediately paid to the athletes as soon as received.”
The deadline could prove existential for the league.
“Tomorrow would be the last day before I think people get pretty upset,” Grant Fisher told reporters Wednesday in Eugene, Oregon, ahead of the U.S. track and field championships, which began Thursday afternoon.
Fisher won his long-distance event group in Kingston and was supposed to be paid $100,000 by Thursday. Fisher is one of 45 athletes owed a total of $3.12 million from the Kingston meet. Those athletes include sprinters Gabby Thomas and Kenny Bednarek, who are each owed $100,000 in prize money alone from Kingston. Thomas left a comment reading “Pls pay me” on Grand Slam’s TikTok account recently.
“The thing is, if the money doesn’t come through, then no athlete is ever going to want to take a chance on a new idea, no investor is going to want to take a chance on a new idea,” Fisher said Wednesday, according to Letsrun. “It’s just going to be an all-around bad thing for the sport if things don’t come through. So my fingers are crossed. I hope it all works.”
Fisher also mentioned the possibility of legal action and said the league had no chance of returning in 2026 if it failed to pay athletes. Johnson and the league’s lead investor, Winners Alliance, say they plan on holding meets again next year.
“If they aren’t able to pay out the debts that they have for this past year, I don’t think it will exist for next year,” Fisher said. “And even if it did somehow exist and they’re still in debt to athletes, no new athlete is going to sign on for the following year.”
His agent, Alistair Cragg, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
