Michael Johnson’s Grand Slam Track league owes $40.68m, according to new filings

New court filings lay bare the desperation that gripped Grand Slam Track (GST) in its debut season, revealing the money laid out and partly clawed back by its commissioner Michael Johnson, the four-time U.S. Olympic gold medalist.

In December, the track league — which it was claimed would revolutionize the sport and see athletes treated as “true professionals” — filed a voluntary petition for relief under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware.

Johnson and his team signed up 48 of the best track athletes on the planet — split equally across men and women — to compete in GST, and promised enhanced travel and premium hotel experiences, as well as a $12.6 million prize pot.

As of now, only half of the money meant to be paid out to athletes has been received. Dozens of them are owed five and six-figure sums. Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone is owed $268,750, Kenny Bednarek $195,000, Gabby Thomas $185,625, Melissa Jefferson-Wooden $174,375 and Marileidy Paulino $173, 125.

Last week, GST submitted a more extensive record of its assets and liabilities, which revealed total debts of $40.68m compared to $831,385 in assets. It also recorded that over $640,000 has been incurred so far in costs related to the bankruptcy and restructuring to law firms, consultants and agencies.

The filings state there are 340 creditors who are collectively owed tens of millions of dollars. This includes more than $3m owed to the Momentum-CHP Partnership for the television production of the league, while the construction firm PMY Ets Usa Inc. says it is owed $1.2m, and the graphics company Girraphic, based in the UK, is owed more than $690,000.

The sums owed to Johnson run into millions. According to the filings, he put $2.25m into the business on May 23, 2025, just one week before the third event in Philadelphia — an event that GST gave serious consideration to pulling.

The latest filings also show that Robert Smith, the billionaire founder of Vista Equity Partners and a board member of GST, stepped in to help fund that Philadelphia meet, as an undetermined amount is listed as having been paid on May 27, just days before the event.

Throughout this period, GST continued to give athletes and vendors no indication that they would not be paid. In an interview with Front Office Sports, published on May 26, Johnson was questioned about the business of the league. While he acknowledged year-one profitability for a start-up was always a difficult ask, he insisted: “We feel good about where we are, we feel like we’re on track with where we need to be.”

The list of creditors also reveals major companies, public institutions and brands impacted by GST.

For example, the W Hotel in Los Angeles is owed around $350,000, and there is a $339,000 credit-card balance owed to American Express. The City of Miramar in Florida is also owed over $77,000, likely for the use of its Ansin Sports Complex to stage the second meet in Miami, while there is over $135,000 owed to Penn Athletics, with the third meet having been held at Franklin Field in Philadelphia. Almost $500,000 is owed to Tata, a global communications and technology company, and over $350,000 to London-based Two Circles, a sports marketing firm.

Over $31,000 remains owed to the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency and $25,000 to World Athletics.

The new filings also include several key revelations. For example, one of the filings declares that GST brought in only $1.8 million in revenue in the entirety of 2025, suggesting the league failed to land major sponsorships or lucrative media-rights contracts.

GST launched to fanfare last spring, opening its season with a meet in Kingston, Jamaica, before further events in Miami and Philadelphia. The fourth and last meet scheduled for Los Angeles in June, however, was cancelled and the league was cut short.

In a press release in September 2024, GST claimed it “secured more than $30 million in financial commitments from investors and strategic partners.” In August, however, an investigation by The Athletic found that GST had received only $13m, with its lead investor, Winners Alliance, having an option — but no obligation — to advance a further $19m. Winners Alliance, whose board is chaired by billionaire Bill Ackman, describes itself as “a for-profit affiliate of the Professional Tennis Players’ Association”, an organization co-founded by 24-time Grand Slam champion Novak Djokovic.

The Athletic’s investigation also revealed that Eldridge, the asset management company chaired by Todd Boehly, chairman of Premier League team Chelsea and part-owner of baseball’s Los Angeles Dodgers and basketball’s Los Angeles Lakers, had last spring signed a preliminary, non-binding term sheet to invest, at minimum, a further $30m.

Yet even as GST scrambled to raise funds, at no stage during the opening three meets did it inform athletes, agents or vendors that the business was running out of cash. This is despite both Johnson and Steve Gera, GST’s president and chief operating officer, foregoing their salaries from the middle of April — coinciding with Eldridge deciding not to go ahead following the meet in Jamaica — according to the new documents.

Johnson had been on an annual salary in excess of $250,000, on the basis of bi-weekly pay-check payments reported in the filings, while Gera’s appears to have been in excess of $200,000 per year initially. However, both leading men went without their salaries for four months from March 31 and then received vastly reduced wage payments from July in the case of Gera and August for Johnson.

The filings record that GST made payments worth $22,074.27 to Johnson between August and December last year, while $25,074.85 was paid to Gera. Both are listed as creditors, with Johnson owed around $222,000 in unpaid wages and Gera owed around $189,000.

Notably, Johnson is one of the parties to have recovered some of what he put in. He received a $500,000 repayment from GST on June 4, just eight days before it cancelled that final meet in Los Angeles. Also, on June 12, Gera was repaid $51,165.50 in travel expenses.

GST did not comment when asked by The Athletic this week if the $500,000 repayment to Johnson required or received GST board approval.

In a statement to The Athletic, a GST spokesperson said that the recent filing “clearly reflects the commitment of our dedicated founders making personal sacrifices to keep the business operating amidst significant financial pressure.”

They also reiterated that the founders “continue to work every day towards enabling the continued operation of the league for one reason only: because they believe in what the league can do for the sport of track.”

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