The Home Depot Center appears to have landed another major track event before the starting gun has been fired for the facility's inaugural event Sunday.
The 2005 USA Track & Field Championships will be coming to Carson, according to organizers of Sunday's Home Depot Invitational. The event will mark the first time the national championships have been held in Southern California since the meet was held at Cerritos College in 1990.

Official bidding hasn't begun for the 2005 national championships but a source within the Home Depot Invitational organizing committee said the event has been "promised' by USATF, the national governing body of track and field.

Michael Roth, a spokesperson for the Anschutz Entertainment Group, which has spearheaded the Home Depot Center an 85-acre, $140-million project at Cal State Dominguez Hills that has been designated as an official U.S. Olympic training site said a proposal has been made to USATF.

"Hopefully when the world track community finally views the facility, they will award Los Angeles the event,' Roth said. "People really don't have a sense of what the Home Depot Center is going to be. We feel that the investment in the entire project and venue will really justify the world class meet coming to our facility and Southern Califor nia.'

The 2005 USATF Championships would add to the growing list of competitions at the Home Depot Center that kicks off with Sunday's meet, which will serve as the third stop on the USATF Golden Spike Tour and be televised live by ESPN2.

The 2006 IAAF World Cup has been awarded to the Home Depot Center, which also includes a 27,000-seat soccer stadium, 13,000-seat tennis stadium, velodrome and will serve as the new training camp for the San Diego Chargers.

UCLA, USC and Long Beach State have joined forces to host the 2005, 2006 and 2007 NCAA championships. The proposal was filed with the NCAA in March. A collegiate championship has not been held in Los Angeles for nearly 50 years.

Planning is in the works to bring the state high school and junior college championships to Carson as well.

USATF CEO Craig Masback wasn't able to officially confirm the location of the 2005 national meet but hinted that the Home Depot Center is the frontrunner. Masback said it was difficult to evaluate the Home Depot Center because no events have been held there and no formal facility requirement list has been drawn up for the 2005 USATF meet.

"Logic would suggest that if Los Angeles is going to host a very major event the next year and is interested and puts in a good bid, they are going to get it because we would like to have a dry run for the World Cup,' Masback said. "I think if they want it with the way they do things, they will get it. I would be disappointed if they didn't.'