The Pine Forest track and field teams are inviting other programs to “bring all the smoke” on April 5.
The Eagles will be hosting their second invitational of the regular season at its brand new facility with the Smokey’s BBQ Bringing All the Smoke Invitational. Currently, Pine Forest head coach Richard Dix said over 20 teams are scheduled to compete.
With the postseason nearing for the Florida High School Athletic Association track and field season – the Escambia County Championships are just a few weeks away on April 11, and will also be at Pine Forest – Dix is anticipating most Florida-based teams to use the invitational as an “insurance plan” for the postseason.
The Smokey’s BBQ Invitational will be a qualifier meet, meaning those times can be used as seeds for the regional track meet in May, in case districts doesn’t go quite to plan for area runners.
Dix said he’s comparing the upcoming invitational to the size of the Running Wild Invitational on March 1, which Pensacola Catholic hosted at Pine Forest’s facility.
“The whole goal and intention is to keep building this meet and do it right, putting on a good product,” Dix said. “That way it can grow every year.”
On top of other small, mid-week meets that the Eagles have hosted, this will be Pine Forest’s fifth big invitational at its new facilities. However, it’ll be the third one that Pine Forest is actually hosting itself, between a preseason invitational, the Battle by the Beach Invitational just this past weekend, and now the Smokey’s BBQ Invitational.
All of it is in preparation for Pine Forest hosting most of the postseason invites, including the Escambia County Championships, the District 1-2A and District 1-3A meets, as well as the Region 1-1A, Region 1-2A and Region 1-3A meets – sure to bring more and more teams, and more and more talent.
“Having a track that we have is the greatest blessing and the worst nightmare. You have to keep up the maintenance. I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Dix said. “But it’s great for the community. The coaches, when they come over, treat it like their own. It’s been a great deal for the last few meets we’ve hosted there. Everyone’s maintained the integrity and beauty of the track. I can’t wait to see what happens as we go forward.”
‘It’s about the community’
Every track coach that has used, or hosted a meet at, the track has helped with opinions and suggestions on how to make things better. Dix called using the track a “collaboration” between area coaches.
“What we do is we take and learn from every meet at our facility. All the coaches in the community have come together to say, ‘Hey, how can we make things better for every track meet?’ It hasn’t just been a Pine Forest thing. It’s been a collaboration of all the coaches to say, ‘Why don’t we look at this or that?’ I’m all ears, as long as we come together and can build the best proud and make the best product when it comes to a track meet in Northwest Florida,” Dix said. “It gets better and better each meet.”
A few hundred fans, on top of the numerous athletes, were at the Paul W. Bryan Spring Break Battle by the Beach Invitational.
“At the end of the day, it’s about the community. The track may be on Pine Forest’s campus and we get that benefit. But at the end of the day, that track is for the community and all the schools in Escambia County to come run and have a good place where we can put a good track meet on. I value opinions and things from other coaches on how we can make things better,” Dix said. “If we make things better, there’s no telling what kind of meets we could host in the future – and everyone is going to benefit from that.”
That community includes those outside of the track world, like David Barry, who owns Smokey’s BBQ on Pensacola Boulevard. He planned on trying to sponsor an invitational with Pine Forest’s former head coach Paul Bryan, who retired at the end of the 2024 season.
It’ll be the inaugural invitational sponsored by Smokey’s.
“As a businessperson, I realize when people come to town for tournaments or big track meets, I’m not getting all of them. That doesn’t matter. That’s not what it’s about. What it’s about is the whole community,” Barry said. “The community either wins together or loses together. … That’s why Paul wouldn’t have a big track meet. Because he wanted a big facility he could be proud of. He didn’t want to bring everyone here and then have to run the meet at Washington. … The track meet is just another way to help the area get exposure
With outside support from different businesses in Pensacola, Dix hopes that Barry helps start a trend of other companies or businesses to help sponsor invitationals or other big meets, noting the upfront cost of anywhere from $3,000 to $7,000, depending on the size of the field.
That way the true envisioned dream of what the new Pine Forest track and field facility was built to provide.
“I don’t know if we’ll see the dream come to fruition until we have the stands packed on May 2 when we have the 2A and 3A regional meets going on. But the vision is there. We sometimes find ourselves looking at the stands during meets and saying, ‘Man, this is what we dreamed of,’” Dix said. “Any chance we can get the community involved to help give them an opportunity to display their name and put on a good show for them, I hope it moves into the future where more companies and businesses say, ‘Hey, we’ll sponsor an invitational. … To be able to finally bring the community together and to finally host, it’s been great. Dave has been nothing but supportive and a great help.”
“After this track meet, I just want to see Pine Forest have some PRs with some more steps to get ready for state. That’s what it’s all about. Hopefully there’s some good competition,” Barry said. “Iron sharpens iron, right?”
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Pine Forest's new track and field facility prepares for Smokey's BBQ Invite
