TRACK AND FIELD : Indoor Meet Is on the Mark Despite Dropouts

The Sunkist Invitational indoor track meet, first rocked on Jan. 17 by the Northridge earthquake and battered again this week by two big-name dropouts, nonetheless will make its 35th go-around at the Sports Arena today.

Promoter Al Franken lost perhaps his best race Thursday when Olympic champion sprinter Gail Devers withdrew from the 50-meter race after being told that Russian sensation Irina Privalova had been added to the field.

Franken said Devers’ representatives wanted more appearance money than the agreed-to $9,000 to run against Privalova, which Devers’ coach, Bob Kersee, didn’t deny.

Friday, Franken lost miler Steve Scott. Still the American mile record-holder, Scott called in sick with flu.

“It’s been a very rough go this year,” Franken said of the meet he has promoted since 1960.

“The Sports Arena was closed for 10 days for earthquake inspection, right after we’d started promoting the meet, and that certainly didn’t help advance ticket sales. They even closed the box office.”

For several days, before it was known whether the Sports Arena would be available, Franken secured alternate dates at UCLA’s Pauley Pavilion and at the Forum.

Franken said he hopes that Devers will reconsider and run against Privalova, and he plans to hold Devers’ lane assignment open until race time, 7:40 p.m.

Barring more dropouts, these should be tonight’s spotlighted events:

--The women’s 880, where Maria Mutola of Mozambique will chase Mary Decker Slaney’s 14-year-old meet record of 1:59.7. Mutola ran a 2:02.85 half-mile in this meet last year and later won the indoor and outdoor world championships.

--The women’s 50-meter hurdles, where Jackie Joyner-Kersee, two-time Olympic heptathlon champion, will face two athletes ranked among the top five U.S. hurdlers, Marsha Guialdo and Dawn Bowles.

--The decathlon hurdles and long jump, where 1993 world champion Dan O’Brien will begin his drive to a hoped-for 9,000-point decathlon later this year. He holds the world record of 8,891.

--The featured miler will be Marcus O’Sullivan of Ireland, who has history’s third-fastest indoor mile, 3:50.84, and three indoor world 1,500-meter championships.

--The men’s shotput, where Randy Barnes, outdoor (75-10 1/4) and indoor (74-4 1/2) world record-holder, towers over the field.

The first event for about 1,500 high school athletes will be held at 11 a.m. and the meet will continue throughout the afternoon. Open competition starts at 6 p.m. with the pole vault, and the first running event is set for 7:05 p.m.; the final race, the mile, starts at 9:55.