A steady stream of visitors, attracted to the Dynamic New Athletics poster presentation during the October 25th ‘Athletics for All’ workshop at the European Athletics Convention in Batumi, Georgia, highlighted increasing interest in the potential of DNA’s offer for the sport.

Leading the presentation, European Athletics vice-president Cherry Alexander, who also chairs the Events and Competition Commission, used the opportunity to list the milestones in the development of the concept, DNA’s features, and key aspects about the future of the project.

Alexander’s messages included that surveys conducted by European Athletics show young athletes have really enjoyed taking part in the first four editions of the DNA U20 Clubs, also known as the ‘Clash of the Clubs’, and that she expects the next phase of the project to see a number of DNA events at the schools level in different countries.

“I wanted our sport’s leaders from around Europe to understand that DNA is not meant to replace the classical format but we want to add something popular that can help them increase participation and grow the sport,” she said.

Explaining that the workshop design requiring the participants to move on to a new presentation station every six or eight minutes meant it was not possible to discuss details about the project in depth, Alexander said she referred her audience to the www.dna.run website for further information.

“We could see that DNA was consistently drawing one of the larger groups at each of the changeovers, which indicates this is a topic people are somewhat familiar with and want to hear more about the progress we are making.”

“I was happy to get a number of questions and positive feedback later in the day and the level of engagement over the weekend was very encouraging,” she said, “it was wonderful, really. “

Adding that there is already strong interest of teams to compete in the next Clash of the Clubs, Alexander said she expects to announce the venue for the 2026 event early in the New Year.