Sport: Penn. v. Drake

In 1893, four Princeton and four Pennsylvania trackmen found a way to make their competition more exciting—by running against each other successively by twos in a mile race instead of simultaneously at 440 yards. That was the origin of modern relay racing, since become the most popular form of intercollegiate track competition, and the beginning of the

Pennsylvania Relay Carnival which started two years later in Philadelphia.

The Drake Relays, inaugurated 15 years later and held at Des Moines on the same week-end each spring, have recently become a serious rival to Penn's....