Over a span of just two months this past. summer, Lincoln, Nebraska hosted five major national or international sports events, highlighting the city’s versatility and reinforcing what local tourism officials have known for years.
“We say Lincoln is a best-kept secret,” says Derek Bombeck, director of sports for Visit Lincoln. “As more people come to Lincoln and see the quality of high-end sports facilities we have, they also see a metropolitan area that has a great downtown with lots of entertainment and restaurants. They go home and tell others, ‘Yeah, you need to check out Lincoln.’”
Tens of thousands of people checked out Lincoln between early July and early September this year, as the state’s second largest city hosted the 2024 USA Roller Sports National Championships (most of July and into August), the 2024 NXT Pro Finals (July 26-28), the inaugural Lincoln Challenger ATP tennis event (Aug. 4-11), Garmin Gravel Worlds 2024 cycling and running events (Aug. 22-24) and the 2024 Tire Rack Sports Car Club of America Solo National Championships (Sept. 3-6).
“This was a very impactful summer for sports tourism,” Bombeck says. “Tens of thousands of athletes and their families, plus spectators, came to Lincoln and spent tens of millions of dollars. It’s a testament to the growth of Lincoln and what we’re doing with our facilities to stay competitive in the industry.”
2024 USA Roller Sports National Championships
Lincoln is home to USA Roller Sports and the National Museum of Roller Skating, which contains the world’s largest collection of historical roller skates, as well as patents, medals, trophies, photos, art, film, costumes, archival materials and skating memorabilia. The city hosted the National Championships for the third year of a three-year contract, and it spanned multiple weeks, bringing in more than 4,500 competitors from 41 states in speed skating, rink hockey, artistic skating and roller derby to generate an economic impact of about $6 million, according to Bombeck.
All events were held at Speedway Sports Complex (previously known as Speedway Village), a sports facility that provided 80,000 square feet of indoor floor space reformatted to fit USA Roller Sports’ needs.
Lincoln will take a year off from hosting nationals in 2025 and then bid to host them again in 2026 and beyond, Bombeck says. “USA Roller Sports feel like Lincoln is home to this event, even though it rotates around the country,” he adds. “Not just because the museum and national governing body staff is here, but because of the way Lincoln embraces this event.”
2024 NXT Pro Finals
Multiple facilities in and around Lincoln (including Speedway Sports Complex, Kinetic Sports Complex and several Lincoln Public Schools gymnasiums) hosted basketball games for the 2024 NXT Pro Finals, which showcased 750 of the top high school boys’ basketball teams in the country. All told, more than 7,500 players from 41 states participated. By comparison, when Lincoln first hosted the tournament in 2023, about 300 teams competed.
Speedway and Kinetic each can accommodate up to eight basketball courts (and 12 volleyball courts), and some facilities in nearby Omaha also provided playing space. The tournament went so well, Bombeck says, that NXT Pro likely will bring either a women’s or girls’ event to Lincoln in 2025.
ATP Lincoln Challenger
This first-time professional tennis event, held at the University of Nebraska’s Sid and Hazel Dillion Tennis Center, was part of the ATP Challenger Tour (which is considered a stepping stone to the ATP Tour and features some of the world’s finest young players). In all, 75 competitors from 16 countries competed.
“We had only about six weeks to prepare for this one, when a typical Challenger event takes a year to plan,” Bombeck says, noting that a previously scheduled date on the tour fell through. “Peter Kobelt, the men’s head tennis coach at Nebraska, reached out and said this would be a great event for Lincoln. I’m always looking to connect with new organizations, and we had never hosted any professional tennis under my watch at Visit Lincoln, so I was super-excited about this opportunity.”
Because there was the potential Nebraska student-athletes might qualify for and compete in the Lincoln Challenger (which they did), the university’s athletic department was not permitted to help organize or promote the event. So Visit Lincoln worked with a third-party events company to help oversee the event, sold more than 1,500 tickets, an unexpectedly high number, and worked with the host hotel to provide tennis-themed drinks and meals for players and their families.
Bombeck anticipates that Lincoln will host another ATP event in 2025.
Garmin Gravel Worlds 2024
This series of cycling events ranging from 50K to 300 miles that take place on rural dirt roads just north of Lincoln has become an annual staple. (There also are running and other non-cycling activities.) In 2024, the 14th year that Lincoln hosted, Garmin Gravel Worlds attracted 2,000 riders from 48 states, 17 countries and five continents.
For the start and finish this year, Garmin Gravel Worlds moved to the Sandhills Global Event Center, which is the largest public gathering space in Lancaster County. The area was packed with energy, Bombeck says, and featured a festive atmosphere with live music, food trucks, local vendors, a rider and runner expo, live panels with pro athletes and family-friendly activities.
The new start/finish site will help the event grow significantly in both size and stature, according to Bombeck, and it provides fast and easy access to Lincoln’s well-maintained gravel trails.
“The organizers give tens of thousands of dollars back to nonprofits in the community each year,” he says. “And as much as they want to grow the event, they also want to support Lincoln and make Lincoln the gravel capital of the world within the next five years. The event already is one of the biggest gravel events in the world, but the community, the county and the state want to help make it the biggest.”
2024 Tire Rack Sports Car Club of America Solo National Championships
For the 15th consecutive year, a large portion of the Lincoln Air Park was transformed into an autocross venue for high-end and special-built cars to race on temporary circuits. It attracted 1,700 of the top drivers in the country in 2024.
“The footprint of this event takes up miles and miles of space, and host communities need to have space for two different race courses and a warmup track,” Bombeck says, noting that the rest of the regional airport remained operational throughout the course of the event. “Then there’s staging, camping, tents for food and beverage. We take care of their needs, and that’s why they come back year after year.”
‘We Are Never Done Growing’
Speaking of coming back year after year, the goal of the opening-soon Sandhills Global Youth Complex is to make Lincoln a major destination for youth baseball and softball, among the few sports the city previously struggled to accommodate, citing a lack of facilities.
Designed to be the first of its kind in Nebraska, the complex will feature eight lighted, all-turf fields designed for use by community members as well as national travel teams. The facility also will be home to Nebraska Wesleyan University’s baseball and softball teams, plus will feature a field designed for boys and girls with special needs.
Ground broke last year on the $27 million facility, named after the Lincoln-based information technology company that contributed $4 million to the project, and now the 2025 events schedule is filling up, Bombeck says.
“We’re trying to build one of the best baseball/softball complexes in the United States,” he adds. “But we are never done growing. The goal is to be versatile and increase Lincoln’s status as a sport tourism destination.” SDM
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