Can we get sports back during coronavirus? Eyes may be on Fort Worth’s experiment
Fort Worth has positioned itself to be a test for whether pared-down sports can return to television amid the novel coronavirus pandemic.
With the PGA Tour aiming to restart its season June 8 in Fort Worth and NASCAR hoping to run a race at Texas Motor Speedway around the same time, city promoters say it’s the perfect move to showcase Fort Worth to a captive national audience. But health officials caution that many steps must be taken to ensure events don’t spread COVID-19. Much is still unknown.
Fort Worth Mayor Betsy Price acknowledged that hosting NASCAR and the Charles Schwab Challenge would be an experiment, but one that she hoped would pay off for the city.
“This is a golden opportunity for us to say ‘Working with health officials this is how we can move forward’ with Fort Worth at the front,” Price said. “I think people are looking for a morale boost and this can be it. And a boost to the economy.”
Fort Worth and Tarrant County’s coronavirus restrictions, which ban gatherings outside a household and have closed most businesses, expire at the end of April, though they can be extended. Price rejected the idea the the PGA Tour would be given special treatment at a time when much of the city might still be locked down.
“I’d be shocked if our citizens would be allowed to host large gatherings by then, and I don’t expect gathers would be allowed at Colonial either,” Price said, saying she would not support banquets or other gatherings attached to the golf tournament.
Tarrant County Judge Glen Whitley said he hoped that by mid-May the region could begin to loosen restrictions and open businesses. If that’s the case, then he would support the PGA Tour opening in Fort Worth.
“I think people are hungry for something normal,” Whitley said. “If they can make it work, safely, then more power to them.”
Officials with Texas Motor Speedway and the PGA Tour said events would not be held if proper testing and safety measures can’t be taken to ensure competitors and the public are not at risk. They’re working with health experts to form plans for testing and monitoring those involved in each event.
In announcing that NASCAR would return to Texas Motor Speedway “very soon,” track president Eddie Gossage said the plan to test drivers, pit crew members and others at the track would be through taking temperatures rather than the nasal swab tests.
The PGA Tour is working with medical experts to evaluate the best plan to test players, caddies and others who will be on the course grounds, said Joel Schuchmann, the PGA Tour’s spokesman.
Much about how either event will work remains unknown, with officials calling both situations “fluid.”
It’s unclear how many people each event would bring to Fort Worth.
With an expected field of almost 150 players, there would be at least 300 players and caddies. There would likely be hundreds more, including PGA Tour staff, a CBS Sports TV crew and volunteers. Colonial Country Club is still working with the PGA Tour to establish the minimum number of people needed that week, said Rob Hood, chairman.
Gossage, meanwhile, estimated that 1,800 people would be needed to stage a race, including competitors, officials, emergency team, TV network, radio network and suppliers (tires and fuel).
Where all these people will stay has not been determined.
Price said she wanted golf event staff and competitors to stay in one to two hotels so those coming to Fort Worth were contained to the same place. But in years past many pro golfers have stayed in homes in the neighborhood around Colonial Country Club.
Nothing is definitive as far as lodging for the Colonial.
At TMS, the hope would be for drivers to come in and out in one day to minimize overnight stays. It would be a one-day, made-for-TV event instead of the usual two or three days of practices and qualifying.
More work needed
It is too early to know whether the coronavirus outbreak will have waned enough for sporting events to be safe, even without fans, said Diana Cervantes, a professor of biostatistics and epidemiology at HSC Fort Worth. Health experts agree the best way to prevent the spread of the virus is by limiting interactions between people, and Cervantes said it’s unlikely that it will be safe to gather by the end of May.
Taking everyone’s temperature daily is a good step to ensure people aren’t sick, she said, but the coronavirus can infect a person without causing symptoms. Event hosts and the city should be prepared to do more than gauge temperatures and enforce social distancing.
“You have to assume universal infections,” she said. “Everyone could be infectious.”
Cervantes suggested event hosts have participants quarantine when they arrive in the city, especially if they’re coming from a hotspot.
It’s unlikely testing will become readily available by June so that everyone working at Texas Motor Speedway or Colonial Country Club can be tested.
Officials should be prepared to do robust and rapid contact tracing, so if someone involved in an event becomes sick, those exposed can be quickly found and quarantined. Limiting golfers’ or drivers’ movement in Fort Worth and having them stay in the same hotel would make that work easier, but it may require tracking visitors, she said.
The coming weeks will be crucial to knowing if the pandemic will have subsided enough to hold events in June, Cervantes said. Signs, like the availability of hospital beds, point to the possibility the outbreak is leveling off.
“Anything that requires more and more people getting together — we’re not there yet,” she said. “We have to stay on top of it.”
Boosting Fort Worth
Last year the tournament generated $33 million for the Fort Worth area economy and another $14 million for charity, Hood said, though that number would be significantly less without fans visiting the city.
Gossage isn’t aware of a recent study, but said race weekends in the past have had an economic impact in the $75 million range.
Still, promoters of Fort Worth say hosting the event will be an economic boon for the city.
The Charles Schwab Challenge would fill about 350 hotel rooms each night of the tournament, without fans, said Bob Jameson, president and CEO of Visit Fort Worth. That’s enough to kick start the local hotel economy. The visitor’s bureau doesn’t have specifics about hotel revenue related to Texas Motor Speedway since many race fans stay in Fort Worth suburbs.
In March hotel visits were down about 50% but have since plummeted to 5% to 15% occupancy.
“With a baseline close to zero, anything will help,” said Jameson.
But broadcasting Fort Worth across the country as the first televised sporting event since the outbreak has longterm benefits for the city’s national exposure, Jameson said. CBS has done a “marvelous job” of highlighting the city during past broadcasts, he said. That’s key to sparking interest in people looking for a Texas vacation or convention location.
“This a real chance for eyes on Fort Worth,” he said.
This story was originally published April 27, 2020 at 6:00 AM.
