Athletics
- For the Major League Baseball team, see Oakland Athletics.
Athletic events are usually organised around a 400 m running track, on which most of the running events take place. Field events (jumping and throwing) often take place in the field in the centre of the running track.
Many athletic events have an ancient origin and were already conducted in competitive form by the ancient Greeks. Athletics was included in the Olympic Games in 1896 and has been part of the program ever since. An international governing body, the IAAF was founded in 1912. The IAAF established separate outdoor World Championships in 1983. The AAU (Amateur Athletic Union) was the governing body in the United States until it collapsed under pressure from advancing professionalism in the late 1970's. A new governing body called The Athletics Congress (TAC) was formed, it was later renamed USA Track and Field (USATF or USA T&F). An additional, less structured organization, the Road Runners Club of America (RRCA) also exists in the USA to promote road racing. Both organizations allow athletes to receive money for racing putting an end to the "shamateurism" that existed before.
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2 World Records 3 See also |
Men and women do not compete against each other. Women generally run the same distances as men although hurdles and steeplechase barriers are lower and the weights of the shot, discus, javelin and hammer are less.
Events
There are other variations besides the ones listed below but races of unusual length (e.g. 300 m) are run much less often. With the exception of the mile run, races based on imperial distances are rarely run on the track anymore since most tracks have been converted from a quarter mile (402.3 m) to 400 meters.World Records
Men
| Event | Record | Athlete | Date | Place |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 100 m | 10.49s | Florence Griffith Joyner (USA) | July 16, 1988 | Indianapolis, Ind, USA |
| 200 m | 21.34s | Florence Griffith Joyner (USA) | Sept 29, 1988 | Seoul, S. Korea |
| 400 m | 47.60 | Marita Koch (E. Germany) | Oct 6, 1985 | Canberra, Australia |
| 800 m | 1:53.28 | Jarmila Kratochvílová (Czechoslovakia) | July 26, 1983 | Munich, W. Germany |
| 1000 m | 2:28.98 | Svetlana Masterkova (Russia) | Aug 23, 1996 | Brussels, Belgium |
| 1500 m | 3:50.46 | Qu Junxia (China) | Sept 11, 1993 | Beijing, China |
| 2000 m | 5:25.36 | Sonia O'Sullivan (Rep. Ireland) | July 8, 1994 | Edinburgh, Scotland |
| 3000 m | 8:06.11 | Wang Junxia (China) | Sept 13, 1993 | Beijing, China |
| 5000 m | 14:24.68 | Elvan Abeylegesse (Turkey) | June 11, 2004 | Bergen, Norway |
| 10,000 m | 29:31.78 | Wang Junxia (China) | Sept 8, 1993 | Beijing, China |
| 20,000 m | 1:05:26.6 | Tegla Loroupe (Kenya) | Sept 3, 2000 | Borgholzhausen, Germany |
| 25,000 m | 1:27:05.8 | Tegla Loroupe (Kenya) | Sept 21, 2002 | Mengerskirchen, Germany |
| 30,000 m | 1:45:50.0 | Tegla Loroupe (Kenya) | June 7, 2003 | Warstein, Germany |
| 3000 m steeplechase | 9:01.59 | Gulnara Samitova, (Russia) | July 4, 2004 | Heraklion, Greece |
| 100 m hurdles | 12.21s | Yordanka Donkova (Bulgaria) | Aug 20, 1988 | Stara Zagora, Bulgaria |
| 400 m hurdles | 52.34s | Yuliya Pechenkina (Russia) | Aug 8, 2003 | Tula, Russia |
| High jump | 2.09m | Stefka Kostadinova (Bulgaria) | Aug 30, 1987 | Rome, Italy |
| Pole vault | 4.90m | Yelena Isinbeyeva (Russia) | July 30, 2004 | London, England |
| Long jump | 7.52m | Galina Chistyakova (USSR) | June 11, 1988 | Leningrad, USSR |
| Triple jump | 15.50 | Inesa Kravets (Ukraine) | Aug 10, 1995 | Göteborg, Sweden |
| Shot put | 22.63 | Natalya Lisovskaya (USSR) | June 7, 1987 | Moscow, USSR |
| Discus | 76.80 | Gabriele Reinsch (E. Germany | July 9, 1988 | Neubrandenburg, E. Germany |
| Hammer throw | 75.97m | Mihaela Melinte (Romania) | May 13, 1999 | Clermont-Ferrand, France |
| Javelin | 71.54m | Osleidys Menéndez (Cuba) | July 1, 2001 | Rethymno, Greece |
| Heptathlon | 7291 pts | Jackie Joyner-Kersee (USA) | Sept 23-24, 1988 | Seoul, S. Korea |
| 12.69s (110 m hurdles), 1.86m (high jump), 15.80 m (shot put), 22.56s (200 m), 7.27m (long jump), 45.66m (javelin), 2:08.51 (800 m) | ||||
| 5 km walk | 20:02.60 | Gillian O'Sullivan (Rep. of Ireland) | July 13, 2002 | Dublin, Ireland |
| 10 km walk | 41:56.23 | Nadezhda Ryashkina (USSR) | July 24, 1990 | Seattle, Wa, USA |
| 4x100 m Relay | 41.37 | Silke Gladisch, Sabine Rieger, Ingrid Auerswald, Marlies Göhr (E. Germany) | Oct 6, 1985 | Canberra, Australia |
| 4x200 m Relay | 1:27.46 | LaTasha Jenkins, LaTasha Colander-Richardson, Nanceen Perry, Marion Jones (USA) | April 29, 2000 | Philadelphia, Pa, USA |
| 4x400 m Relay | 3:15.17 | Tatyana Ledovskaya, Olga Nazarova, Mariya Pinigina, Olga Bryzgina (USSR) | Oct 1, 1988 | Seoul, S. Korea |
| 4x800 m Relay | 7:50.17 | Nadezhda Olizarenko, Lyubov Gurina, Lyudmila Borisova, Irina Podyalovskaya (USSR) | Aug 5, 1984 | Moscow, USSR |
| Marathon | 2:15:25 | Paula Radcliffe (UK) | April 13, 2003 | London, England, UK |
See also