Portal:Sport of athletics

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Introduction

A copy of the Ancient Greek statue Discobolus, portraying a discus thrower

Athletics is a group of sporting events that involves competitive running, jumping, throwing, and walking. The most common types of athletics competitions are track and field, road running, cross-country running, and racewalking.

The results of racing events are decided by finishing position (or time, where measured), while the jumps and throws are won by the athlete that achieves the highest or furthest measurement from a series of attempts. The simplicity of the competitions, and the lack of a need for expensive equipment, makes athletics one of the most common types of sports in the world. Athletics is mostly an individual sport, with the exception of relay races and competitions which combine athletes' performances for a team score, such as cross country.

Organized athletics are traced back to the Ancient Olympic Games from 776 BC. The rules and format of the modern events in athletics were defined in Western Europe and North America in the 19th and early 20th century, and were then spread to other parts of the world. Most modern top level meetings are held under the auspices of World Athletics, the global governing body for the sport of athletics, or its member continental and national federations. (Full article...)

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German javelin thrower Thomas Röhler in 2011

The javelin throw is a track and field event where the javelin, a spear about 2.5 m (8 ft 2 in) in length, is thrown as far as possible. The javelin thrower gains momentum by running within a predetermined area. Javelin throwing is an event of both the men's decathlon and the women's heptathlon. (Full article...) The javelin throw was added to the Ancient Olympic Games as part of the pentathlon in 708 BC. It included two events, one for distance and the other for accuracy in hitting a target. The javelin was thrown with the aid of a thong (ankyle in Greek) that was wound around the middle of the shaft. Athletes held the javelin by the ankyle, and when they released the shaft, the unwinding of the thong gave the javelin a spiral trajectory.

Throwing javelin-like poles into targets was revived in Germany and Sweden in the early 1870s. In Sweden, these poles developed into the modern javelin, and throwing them for distance became a common event there and in Finland in the 1880s. The rules continued to evolve over the next decades; originally, javelins were thrown with no run-up, and holding them by the grip at the center of gravity was not always mandatory. Limited run-ups were introduced in the late 1890s, and soon developed into the modern unlimited run-up.[1]: 435–436 

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Selected biography

Abrahams in June 1921

Harold Maurice Abrahams CBE (15 December 1899 – 14 January 1978) was an English track and field athlete. He was Olympic champion in 1924 in the 100 metres sprint, a feat depicted in the 1981 film Chariots of Fire. (Full article...)

A sprinter and long jumper since his youth, he continued to compete in running while at Cambridge. Abrahams earned a place in the 1920 Olympic team,[2] but was eliminated in the quarter-finals of both the 100 m and the 200 m, and finished 20th in the long jump.[2] He was also part of the British relay team that took fourth place in the 4 × 100 m.[3]

Although Abrahams dominated British long jump and sprint events, after graduating from Cambridge, he employed Sam Mussabini, a professional coach, who improved his style and training techniques in preparation for the 1924 Olympics in Paris, France.[3][4]

For six months, Mussabini emphasised the 100 m at Abrahams's direction, with the 200 m as secondary. Through vigorous training, Abrahams perfected his start, stride and form. One month before the 1924 Games, Abrahams set the English record in the long jump 24 feet 2+12 inches (7.38 m), a record which stood for the next 32 years.[2] The same day he ran the 100-yard dash in 9.6 seconds, but the time was not submitted as a record because the track was on a slight downhill.[5]

At the 1924 Summer Games, Abrahams won the 100 m in a time of 10.6 seconds, beating all the American favourites, including the 1920 gold-medal winner Charley Paddock.[2] In third place was Arthur Porritt, later Governor-General of New Zealand and Queen's Surgeon. The Paris Olympics 100 m dash took place at 7 p.m. on 7 July 1924, and Abrahams and Porritt dined together at 7 p.m. on 7 July every year thereafter, until Abrahams's death in 1978. Teammate Eric Liddell, the British 100-yard dash record holder at that time, declined to compete in the Paris 100 m because one of the heats for the event was held on a Sunday. Both Liddell and Abrahams competed in the final of the 200 m race, with Liddell finishing third and Abrahams sixth.[2] Liddell went on to win the gold medal in the 400 metres. Abrahams was the opening runner for the British 4 × 100 m team, which won the silver medal. He did not compete in the long jump.[3]

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World records

World records as of 9 April 2024
Event Men Record Women Record
100 m Jamaica Usain Bolt 9.58 United States Florence Griffith Joyner 10.49
200 m Jamaica Usain Bolt 19.19 United States Florence Griffith Joyner 21.34
400 m South Africa Wayde van Niekerk 43.03 East Germany Marita Koch 47.60
800 m Kenya David Rudisha 1:40.91 Czechoslovakia Jarmila Kratochvílová 1:53.28
1500 m Morocco Hicham El Guerrouj 3:26.00 Kenya Faith Kipyegon 3:49.11
5000 m Uganda Joshua Cheptegei 12:35.36 Ethiopia Gudaf Tsegay 14:00.21
10,000 m Uganda Joshua Cheptegei 26:11.00 Ethiopia Letesenbet Gidey 29:01.03
Marathon Kenya Kelvin Kiptum 2:00:35 Kenya Brigid Kosgei 2:14:04
3000 m steeplechase Ethiopia Lamecha Girma 7:52.11 Kenya Beatrice Chepkoech 8:44.32
110 / 100 m hurdles United States Aries Merritt 12.80 Nigeria Tobi Amusan 12.12
400 m hurdles Norway Karsten Warholm 45.94 United States Sydney McLaughlin 50.68
High jump Cuba Javier Sotomayor 2.45 m Bulgaria Stefka Kostadinova 2.09 m
Pole vault Sweden Armand Duplantis 6.23 m Russia Yelena Isinbayeva 5.06 m
Long jump United States Mike Powell 8.95 m Soviet Union Galina Chistyakova 7.52 m
Triple jump United Kingdom Jonathan Edwards 18.29 m Venezuela Yulimar Rojas 15.74 m
Shot put United States Ryan Crouser 23.56 m Soviet Union Natalya Lisovskaya 22.63 m
Discus throw East Germany Jürgen Schult 74.08 m East Germany Gabriele Reinsch 76.80 m
Hammer throw Soviet Union Yuriy Sedykh 86.74 m Poland Anita Włodarczyk 82.98 m
Javelin throw Czech Republic Jan Železný 98.48 m Czech Republic Barbora Špotáková 72.28 m
Decathlon/Heptathlon France Kevin Mayer 9126 pts. United States Jackie Joyner-Kersee 7291 pts.
20 km racewalk Japan Yusuke Suzuki 1:16:36 China Yang Jiayu 1:23:49
4×100 m relay  Jamaica 36.84  United States 40.82
4×400 m relay  United States 2:54.29  Soviet Union 3:15.17

Topics

Athletics events

Events in the sport of athletics

Athletics competitions

It's from the first edition (1896 Summer Olympics), that Athletics has been considered the "Queen" of the Olympics. Since then there have been a series of competitions organized at world level, than at the continental level. Furthermore, the Athletics is the main sport of nearly all multi-sport events such as Universiade, Mediterranean Games or Pan American Games. The following list refers to the main Athletics competitions that take place in the world.

Event 1st edition Kind of competition Can participate
Olympic Games 1896 World games Worldwide
World Championships 1983 World championships
World Indoor Championships 1985
European Championships 1934 Continental championships Europe
European Indoor Championships 1966
South American Championships 1919 South America
Asian Championships 1973 Asia
African Championships 1979 Africa
Ocenian Championships 1990 Oceania

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Sources

  1. ^ Jukola, Martti (1935). Huippu-urheilun historia (in Finnish). Werner Söderström Osakeyhtiö.
  2. ^ a b c d e Kebric, Robert B. (2002) [1992]. Dawson, Dawn P. (ed.). Great Athletes. Vol. 1 (Revised ed.). Salem Press. pp. 11–13. ISBN 1-58765-008-8.
  3. ^ a b c Evans, Hilary; Gjerde, Arild; Heijmans, Jeroen; Mallon, Bill; et al. "Harold Abrahams". Olympics at Sports-Reference.com. Sports Reference LLC. Archived from the original on 2020-04-17.
  4. ^ "Olympics 2000". Sporting Life. Archived from the original on 10 December 2000.
  5. ^ "Uc_Hilal : Jews in Sports @ Virtual Museum". Jewsinsports.org. 14 January 1978. Retrieved 31 January 2011.

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