The 4x200-meter relay is coming to the outdoor track and field season on an experimental basis.

It will not be part of the Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference championship meets. Or the state championship meets for that matter.

But host schools will have the option to run the 4x200, which is a wildly popular event during the indoor season.

If the event is well-received, it may become part of all meets. The Maine Principals' Association will look at the proposal more closely after the season is over.

The experiment raises a few questions.

First, do we really need another relay at an outdoor high school track meet? Aren't the meets long enough already? What about the teams that can't fill three relays, let alone four?

These are a few of the concerns raised by Erskine Academy athletic Director Doran Stout, who is a chairperson on the KVAC Track Committee.

"The host school will decide if they want to run a 4x2," Stout said. "If they do, they can go ahead and run it in their meet. The recommendation is that they don't score it. We won't run it at the KVAC championship -- we're kind of mirroring the state meet."

Stout doesn't feel the need to add another relay, saying the ones already in place -- 4x100, 4x400 and the 4x800 -- cover sprints, middle-distance and distance.

Still, the KVAC will experiment, which should be interesting.

Some, like Lawrence coach Tim Alberts, embrace the new event.

"It adds another event for the sprinters," he said. "We're going to run it."

Lawrence hosts three meets this spring.

Winslow coach Shawn Carey, whose Black Raiders will host a pair of meets, also is on board with the change, but still says, "I'm for it. It is going to lengthen meets a bit, and I don't know why we added it. But I'm planning to have the 4x200. My kids already know about it and they know we'll be running it."

Others, like Maine Central Institute coach Jason Allen, wonder if the addition will help a select few teams.

"It's another way to give bigger schools more points," he said. "For us, it would be like the pole vault -- it would be another 10 points we'd have to make up somewhere else."