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A survey conducted by UCLA's Center for Scholars & Storytellers last year found that the most popular genre of content among viewers between the ages of 10--24 was classifiable as "relatable," featuring "people like me." This marked a shift from previous years' surveys, where "fantasy" reigned supreme among respondents.
Expect the new releases tab of your go-to streaming service to look a little different going forward. Studio executives will eschew stories about dragons, goblins, and teenage magicians, in favor of developing more content calculated to reflect the realities of as many American teenagers as possible.
We like to think of art as an art… but to a certain extent--or at least when it comes to what gets green-lit by studios these days--art is a science. Numbers are dug into, projections made, psychological learnings factored in. All in the name of getting your television program or movie in front of as many paying eyeballs as possible.
That's maybe not the best news for the creative ambitions of screenwriters, but it's potentially exciting for the high school track and field universe. Because if the name of the game is producing content that is going to resonate with over a million high schoolers, track and field's participation numbers are hard to ignore.
To any film execs reading, don't worry. We're going to give you more to work with than "a television show about an American teenager who is on their high school's track team." Here are some helpful plot elements to include in your upcoming smash hit track-based teen drama, to ensure maximum relatability and reach.
For starters, you're going to want to set the story at least partly in Texas. During the 2025 outdoor season there were over 120,000 (70,000 boys and 53,000 girls) high school student-athletes who competed at least once in the Lone Star State, more than in any other U.S. part of the country.
And great news, demographically! Texas also happens to boast the largest rural population in the country (in addition to the second largest urban population… Texas is really big, y'all).
Even more great news: California, the state with the largest urban population--which includes most suburban areas--had the second most high school track and field athletes in 2025, roughly 115,000. (How's that for covering your bases?) Interestingly, when broken down by event, Californian 100m and 200m runners, both boys and girls, slot at the top of the overall participant list, followed by Texan boy 100m and 200m runners.
The pilot episode practically writes itself, as long as you are willing to lean dangerously hard into tropes!
A brother-sister duo--let's call them Buck and Sharlene Acerage--living on a ranch in rural Texas discovers a natural aptitude in the short sprints after chasing down a runaway tractor headed destructively toward the family's home. (Hey, you've got a team of screenwriters at your disposal… you can clean that up a bit.) Once encouraged to join their small school's track team, they realize that track and field might be their ticket out of the rural life they've been brought up in, and to college at Lake Michigan Skyline University, a liberal arts college located at the top of Chicago's Willis Tower. Buck and Sharlene are ultimately bookish, and yearn for a life of study, mass transit, and elaborate coffee drinks.
Meanwhile, halfway across the country in an affluent Los Angeles neighborhood, another brother and sister--let's call them Ron and Rosy Urbano--are join their massive school's track to bolster their resumes for college. The parents want the kids to attend their alma mater, the highly competitive and not real "Los Angeles University." The kids want to get out of the big city rat race and attend college someplace quiet and serene, where they can train to become large animal veterinarians. At their first practice, running on rage, the Urbanos too discover they are naturally gifted sprinters and set their sights on earning scholarships someplace far away.
It's a classic story of contrasting values and desires, that culminates in a "you and I, we're not so different" moment, upsetting nobody. It depicts believable American teenage track athletes--probably portrayed by 30-year-old actors--doing the sorts of things real American teenage track and field athletes do, and presents plenty of opportunities for needledrops of contemporary hyperpop hits and moody, atmospheric lighting and camera work.
As the season unfolds, we cut back and forth between the two families, their vastly different lifestyles and aspirations, and parallel ascension through their state's track and field circuits. And we set the stage for the high stakes finale that, like in any dramatic high school television show, doesn't even pretend to be representative of how things actually function in real life.
The Urbanos and Acerages are on a collision course for the illustrious National Track Classic in New York City. Defying precedent but raising the stakes and intrigue, the coaches from LMSU and Montana's exceedingly rural Bitterroot Veterinary College have decided to give out full ride scholarships to the winners of the State vs. State All-Star Mixed Gender 4 x 200m relay.
Naturally, the California team stars the Urbanos, the Texas squad is headlined by the Acerages. ...We guess there have to be four other athletes, too, but we aren't gonna mess with developing those characters here. Rosy and Sharlene run the lead legs and hand off in a dead heat. Those other kids don't manage to muck things up too badly, and everything comes down to Ron vs. Buck. There's lots of slow motion throughout, and the scene lasts for over five minutes despite the actual race theoretically taking a fraction of the time.
Who wins? Who gets to attend their dream college? Who finds out what about themselves as well as their rivals? Well, Hollywood big shot, you gotta get to work on this irresistible and wildly relatable story to find out!