Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : Runners Face New Hurdle at Track : Athletics: Quake damaged College of the Canyons running track and stadium. Uncertainty over repairs may affect practice and competitions.

Track and field athletes at College of the Canyons have an additional hurdle to clear this season because of the Northridge earthquake.

The temblor cracked the stadium’s running track and the base of the surrounding seating section, leading college officials to declare the area off-limits to the public for weeks.

“The track had buckled pretty seriously in some areas, and there was damage to the bleacher concrete area,” said Sue Bozman, public information officer for the college.

Runners consider the track at College of the Canyons an excellent one because of the solid footing it provides, according to members of the Santa Clarita Runners Inc., a local running club.

“The track is probably the best in the valley, based on the type of materials they used. You’ve got consistent conditions all the way through. You’re not going to have dirt or surface runoff with lower and higher areas,” said Dan Powers, a club member.

Track and field season runs February through May, and damage has interrupted practice for the college team and scheduled competitions.

Although team members can now use the undamaged section of the facility, that only clears the way for events such as high jump, javelin and shotput on the interior part of the field. Hurdles and various running events are still off-limits.

“All of the track meets at the college have been relocated,” said Joe Gerda, college athletic director. “It’s a little more complicated than a lot of the other damaged areas we’re dealing with. The damage isn’t as apparent for us.”

School officials are still tallying the damage to the stadium and how much it will cost to prevent additional cracking in the event of another quake.

“This is an expensive job,” Gerda said. “If they have to redo the facilities, that’s a $400,000 job--and that’s just the track.”

Gerda said it could take up to six months to fix the damage. If repairs drag on, it may cause difficulties for the Santa Clarita high schools that plan to use the stadium for graduation ceremonies in June and for football games in the fall.

The campus is believed to have incurred more than $3 million in damage from the Jan. 17 earthquake. Start of the spring semester was delayed a week due to the quake, and most of the 6,500 students found themselves taking at least one class last month in a set of 21 tents erected on the campus’s upper practice field.

As of this week, all displaced students have been moved into portable classrooms, Bozman said.