Various forms of competitive and achievement-oriented
jumping and throwing activities are part of the overall
menu of track and field events. They take place on the
“field” inside or around the running track, though they
have, over time, gradually assumed particular sites
within the arena. The jumping events are made up of the
high jump, the long jump, the triple jump (formerly
called the hop, step, and jump) and the pole vault. The
throwing events involve the propulsion of the following
implements: the shot, javelin, discus, and hammer.
Jumps
A high jump test was the requirement of the king’s warriors in Celtic Ireland about the time of Jesus Christ. At
Dessau, in Germany, around 1776, Johann Friedrich
Simion introduced high jump stands with holes and
pegs to support a bar, the first of its type known.The
first great amateur jumper was the Englishman Marshall Brooks, who in 1876 jumped 1.89 meters (6.20
feet). The next 25 years saw some great jumpers in Ireland and the United States, most of whom did a roll
over the bar from a straight-on approach. Dick Fosbury
and Debbie Brill of Canada revolutionized the event
with their backward arch, called the Fosbury Flop and
the Brill Bend, both used to set record heights.
Pole vaulting apparently began around 1791, when
a pole vault stand was known to exist at Schnepfenthal
School in Germany, but early impetus for competitive
pole vaulting developed in England. The event was featured in the Lake District (northwest England) sports
events.
By the 1890s, sand landing pits had superseded
earth in the United States. The early 1900s saw the ascendancy of U.S. vaulters, who were the first seriously
to use the slightly flexible bamboo pole in about 1906.
U.S. vaulters also had a hole with a backboard into
which they planted their pole instead of thrusting a
spiked pole into the ground.
In the late 1930s, a Russian vaulter experimented
with a flexible green bamboo pole to achieve a worldclass vault. Raised sand and sawdust landing pits were
being used at this time. Flexible Swedish steel poles
were popular in the 1940s. However, experiments from
as early as 1948 had taken place with hollow fiberglass
poles, and from 1961 they ruled supreme. From a modest height of 4.83 meters (15.85 feet) with a heavy slow
reactive pole, the record had shot up to 6.14 meters
(20.14 feet) with longer, lighter, more reactive poles.
Evidence of broad jumping appears in Germany
around 1776. There was a graduated jumping ditch
wider at one end than the other. Jumping pits appear to
have been introduced in the 1860s with broken earth
into which to land. At a later date, sawdust was mixed
with the sod and by 1900 sand pits were fairly common.
In the 1920s top jumpers began to cycle their legs
while jumping, a technique known as the hitch-kick,
which helped them achieve a better leg shoot on landing and hence longer distances. At the Mexico City
Olympics Bob Beamon of the United States achieved a
phenomenal jump of 8.90 meters (29.19 feet), hailed as
a jump of the 21st century.
The triple jump was added to the program at the
1896 Olympics, given that it may have been an ancient
Olympic event. Dreisprungen (“three jumps”) took
place in Bavaria from at least the 15th century. Triple
jumping has had a long history in Scotland with mention of the event, hop, step, and jump, during the 18th
century.
Throws
Putting a stone of about 7.3 kilograms (16 pounds) or
heavier, a shot putt, has been a sport in Europe since at
least the 12th century, especially in Scotland, Bavaria,
and Switzerland. Regular competition with measured
throws began in the Scottish Border Games of the 1820s.
From 1880 to the early 1900s, the Irish were the best
shot putters in the world. The usual practice was to
throw from a 7-foot (2.13-meter) square with stopboard until 1908 when a 7-foot circle became standard.
Parry O’Brien introduced the style of starting his
movement across the circle from a backward position,
culminating with a strong rotational drive of the arm
prior to release. He advanced the record 16 times between 1953 and 1959 to 19.30 meters (63.30 feet). During this time, the concrete circle superseded the cinder
circle.
Women began putting the 8-pound (3.6-kilogram)
shot in the United States in 1907, and in Europe a 5-
kilogram (11-pound) shot was used between 1918 and
1924, after which 4 kilograms (8 pounds, 13 ounces)
became the international standard. In the 1920s and
1930s, the Germans were the best, and from 1945 onward the former Soviet Union has dominated the event,
although East Germans and Czechs have also been
prominent.
The Greek poet Homer speaks of the discus being thrown by the Myceaneans at Troy, which is considered
to have taken place around 1200 B.C.E. The modern
Greeks included the event in their Olympic revival
games of 1859, 1870, 1875, and 1889. Discus throwing
was revived in 19th-century Sweden and included in
the Olympic Games of 1896 in Athens.
The actual discus has hardly changed from 1896,
when it weighed 2 kilograms (4 pounds, 6 ounces) and
was made of wood with a metal rim. The Swedes produced a heavy-rim discus of regulation size and weight
in the 1970s, which allowed more pulling power to be
generated for those throwers with strong fingers.
Improvement in throwing was slow between the
years 1920 and 1941 with Americans advancing the
record year by year. In 1934, Swede Harald Andersson
threw 52.42 meters (171.98 feet), and the next year
Willi Schroder of Germany, 53.10 meters (174.21 feet).
Generally, throwers in the 1930s appreciated the fact
that their discus went further if thrown into the wind.
American Al Oerter won Olympic golds at the four
games between 1956 and 1968.
Women in Europe were throwing the men’s or junior men’s (1.5 kilograms [3 pounds, 5 ounces]) discus
in 1917 and 1921. The following year the 1-kilogram (2
pound, 3 ounce) implement came into general use.
Germany and Poland had the top throwers in the 1920s
and 1930s and the Soviet Union from the 1940s onward
with Romania, Czech Republic, Bulgaria, and East and
West Germany also having prominent throwers.
The hammer throw was known among the Vikings
800 C.E. They threw a hammer to lay claim to land, of
which the best throwers claimed the largest share. An
11th century English legend mentions a hammer-throwing champion in England. In the 16th and 17th centuries
throwing the hammer and other similar implements was
popular. Measured hammer throwing emerges as a regular sport in Scotland and Ireland from 1828.
In 1878 the Amateur Athletic Club of London introduced a 7-foot throwing circle, which was increased to
9 feet (2.7 meters) in 1887 probably to accommodate
the turn, but it is uncertain who developed the turning
technique. Soon after this, particularly in the United
States, flexible malacca cane shafts were used to help
improve distance.
Changing techniques in turning before throwing
led to improved distances. In the late 1940s and early
1950s, a small tungsten-head hammer was marketed,
and the record was advanced even further. Then the Soviet school of throwers emerged and with the benefit of
weight training improved the record year by year. Other
contributing factors were the concrete circle, which replaced cinder in 1955, providing athletes with a
smoother and “quicker” surface from which to throw,
and the likelihood of throwers taking steroids after
1965. Since the stricter clamp-down on drugs, the standard has dropped a few meters. Women’s hammer
throwing stems from 1988 with the countries of the old
Soviet Union to the fore.
Homer described javelin throwing for distance, and
the Mycenaeans practiced it around 1200 B.C.E. The
javelins thrown by the Greeks of 500 B.C.E. were thin
and made of wood, with a string wound around the
center of gravity.When thrown, the thrower would hold
onto the end of the string. This pulling caused rotation
of the javelin, giving greater stability and hence further
distance. The Celts in Ireland, about the time of Jesus
Christ, describe a distance-throwing javelin as having a
flaxen string. Javelin throwing in warfare was comparatively common in many parts of the world through
into modern times, and competitive throwing is known
in Africa and South America within living memory
with distances of 120 and 130 meters (394 and 427
feet) respectively having been claimed.
Both the Swedes and the Finns were holding competitions from 1883. The javelin first became an international event at the unofficial 1906 Olympic Games
held at Athens.
Until 1953, top-class javelins were made in Scandinavia of selected and cured wood. Aluminum and
Swedish steel javelins had appeared in the late 1940s,
but the revolution in aerodynamic design was pioneered by Dick Held in the United States. His new
javelin was of greater circumference and gave a 27 percent increase in surface area; he got away with it because there was no rule against it at the time (one was
introduced in 1957 after his experiment).
The big strong men, of whom some probably took
steroids, steadily improved the record until Uwe Hohn
of East Germany threw the amazing distance of 104.80
meters (343.83 feet) in 1984, which exceeded the safe
throwing area within a stadium. The IAAF took swift
action in 1985 and decreed the center of gravity of the
javelin be moved forward 4 centimeters (1.6 inches).
This had the effect of making the javelin nose-dive earlier in its flight, thus shortening the distance thrown.
Women have a record of javelin throwing from 1912
through 1921 with the 800-gram (28.5-ounce) men’s
model and the regulation 600-gram (21.4-ounce) one
from 1922. The Americans and Germans produced the
best throwers in the 1920s and 1930s, the Soviet Union
in the 1950s and 1960s and in the 1970s.
—DAVID TERRY
Bibliography: Matthews, P. (1996) Athletics 1995: The International Track and Field Annual. Surbiton, UK. Quercetani, R. L. (1990) Athletics: A History of Modern Track
and Field Athletics 1860–1900 Men and Women. Milan:
Vallardi & Associati. Zur Megede, E., and R. Hymans.
(1995) Progression of World Best Performances and Official I.A.A.F World Records. Monaco: IAAF