The Magic Boost

Our vision is a track and field media landscape where those covering the sport more fully reflect and resemble the athletes competing in the stadium: youthful, diverse, and innovative.

The goal of the Magic Boost is to revolutionize how the stories of track and field and its elite athletes are told, where they are told, and by whom they are told.

Chris Chavez poses with Raven Saunders at the 2021 Nike Prefontaine Classic after an interview for CITIUS MAG. Chavez is the driving force behind The Magic Boost.

Photographer: Johnny Zhang

Dana Giordano of the More Than Running podcast interviews Liz Dolan about her career and her work on the Board of Directors for the World Athletics Championships Oregon22.

Photographer: Johnny Zhang

Booster Tiara Williams was hired as a content creator for the World Athletics Championships Oregon22, focusing on athlete stories in the mixed zone and showcasing stadium experience in the stands. Here, she brought her charismatic energy to the youth parade of nations that opened the event.

Photographer: Howard Lao

Booster Dominique Smith gains insights from NBC’s Sanya Richards Ross in an interview for his podcast Lactic Acid.

Photographer: Johnny Zhang

Sha’Carri Richardson is interviewed at the 2021 Nike Prefontaine Classic press conference, where the presence of many Boosters changed the dynamic of the traditional media scrum.

Photographer: Johnny Zhang

The Magic Boost Class of 2021 at Hayward Field.

(Top L-R) Hannah Borenstein, Emma Zimmerman, Nikki Merrill, Katherine Burgess, Dominique Smith, KaDeem Wynn, Dana Giordano, Matt Wisner, Ben Crawford (Bottom L-R) Tiara Williams, Joshua Potts, Aaron Potts, Matthew Parker, Johnny Zhang (Not pictured Elizabeth Hernandez and Ben Weingart).

Photographer: Johnny Zhang

The Magic Boost Class of 2022 at the Bowerman Sports Science Center at Hayward.

(Top L-R) Johnny Pace, Elijah Agurs, Sheridan Wilbur, Diana Ramos, Cole Pressler, Jasmine Todd, Anderson Emerole, John Larracas (Bottom L-R) Jay Bendlin, Alex Andrei, Jillian Michales, Sam Farris (Not pictured Katelyn Hutchison).

Photographer: Johnny Zhang

"Meet The Magic Makers"

To learn more about the individual Boosters and to see their work, click here.

Why does diverse media coverage matter?

In September 2021, the Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport (TIDES) released its latest report card detailing racial and gender hiring practices as requested by the Associated Press Sports Editors (APSE). Bottom line: sports media remains overwhelmingly white and male.
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While editors at the over 100 news outlets included in this report determine what stories to cover, when to cover them and how they are portrayed — and they are white males two-thirds of the time — the on-the-ground reporting demographics are even more out of skew. Sports reporters were found to be 77% white and 85% male.

How does The Magic Boost Compare?

The Magic Boost has 38 alumni, and the racial and gender breakdown of the program’s young professionals looks like this: