In fitting fashion for the current recession, the Georgia track and field team is homeless.

With Spec Towns Track undergoing a facelift to the tune of $3 million, track and field coaches and athletes have turned into an economical bunch that are utilizing any space available around Athens to conduct their workouts.

Head coach Wayne Norton referred to his team as “the wandering crew.”

“Right now, many of our decathletes and pole-vaulters go over [to Athens Academy],” Norton said. “A bunch of our runners and field event guys, like the jumpers, are up here on the intramural fields right now because we are still in our conditioning phase. And we also use the practice football facility as our Friday afternoon venue, so we are all over the place.”

Renovations to the track facility broke ground on June 25 and are expected to continue through November. Among the many improvements, construction crews will resurface the entire track and improve the field’s drainage system that has proved inefficient in recent years.

The much-needed makeover, which is sponsored by UGA Architects, will be the first major improvements to the track since 1986. The construction is also the primary cause for one Athens high school to soon see a certain group of college athletes on its grounds daily.

“Once October gets going, we will be at Athens Academy most of the time,” Norton said. “Hopefully, everything will be ready sometime between Nov. 10 and Thanksgiving.”

Despite the promise the restoration of Spec Towns brings for the future for the program, the improvements do not come without a fair share of sacrifice and shuffled plans.

“We are going to have to bus over to Athens Academy, so I don’t know how that is going to work out as far as everybody getting a ride,” said Tierra Bagby, a junior jumper for the women’s team. “It really does suck not having the track right there for us.”

Georgia should have its fingers crossed that the financial support for the program can push its middle-of-the-pack men’s and women’s squads into the upper-echelon of the annually ultra-competitive Southeastern Conference – which, in turn, would make the university a serious national contender as well.

The improved men’s team finished tied for fifth at the 2009 SEC Outdoor Championships and No. 11 at the 2009 NCAA Outdoor Championships, thanks in large part to the contributions of sprinter Justin Gaymon and javelin thrower Chris Hill. Both Hill and Gaymon have since moved on with their athletic careers.

The women went through a rebuilding season in 2009, finishing near the bottom at both the SEC and NCAA Outdoor Championships.

“It’s going to be nice for us just having a new and improved place – anytime you get something new, there comes an excitement with it,” Norton said. “Hopefully, what it will signify is that the commitment to Georgia track and field is there. To anyone who notices us it says that, ‘OK, track is important enough here to get a nice facelift.’”

The entire conference and nation will take notice of the refurbished facility soon enough – for reasons that have the current Georgia track athletes buzzing.

“I’m looking forward to it all getting done,” Bagby said. “The SEC [Championships] are supposed to be here in 2011, so we are all really excited about that, too.”

For the time being, though, Georgia track and field will have to use any place necessary to stay on the right course towards being one of the nation’s best.

At the present time, they have no permanent place to work on becoming one of the best in the SEC or reaching their goal of becoming a national power.

The Bulldogs’ home, much like its national reputation, is still under construction.