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Athletics

About Athletics

Originating from ancient Greece, Athletics refers to a group of sporting events which include track and field, racewalking, road running and cross country running competitions. It was included in the first ever Olympic Games held in 776 B.C. in Olympia, Greece. The popularity of athletics is rooted in the fact that most of the events such as racing do not require any expensive equipment. The International Amateur Athletics Federation was established in 1913 and is the global governing body of athletics till date. The various disciplines of athletics can be classified as follows:
Track and Field:
Track and field includes the running, throwing and jumping events. They can be broadly classified as follows:
Track
Sprints, Middle-Distance, Long-distance, Hurdles and Relays
Field:

Jumps: (Long Jump, Triple Jump, High Jump, Pole Vault)
Throws: (Shot put, Discus throw, Hammer throw, Javelin throw)

All the running events are held on an oval-shaped track. Whereas Long Jump requires a sand pit at the end of a long lane called straight which is used for the run up before jumping. Pole vault and High Jump have a similar setup except in these events a large mat is used to brace the jumper’s fall. The throwing events require a throwing area that opens into a large space which has been marked for measurements.
In terms of the game play, running events are the most straightforward, the race begins when the starting gun gets fired and finishes when the athletes cross the line. Relays have four runners who pass on the baton after each leg of the run. In the throwing and jumping events, athletes generally get three attempts and the best throw/ jump is counted for the final placing.
The following are some of the basic rules for track and field events:

For running events, the athlete whose chest crosses the finish line first is the winner, provided that there were no false starts.
In the throwing and jumping events, whoever throws or jumps the farthest wins.
In the hurdling events, hitting another hurdle or stepping into another lane leads to disqualification.

Road Running
As the name suggests it refers to the long distance running events on the course of paved roads. It comprises two major events, the Marathon, where the athletes run a distance of 42.195 km and the Half- Marathon, which covers half the distance of a full marathon i.e. 21.0975 km. To keep the runners hydrated, feeding stations are set up to provide water and drinks.
Cross-Country Running
In cross-country running the race takes place on natural terrain. It is an individual as well as a team sport. The distance is usually 3 km or more and the competitions are typically held in autumn and winter. While the competition is no longer separately a part of the Olympics, it is a part of the modern pentathlon.
Racewalking
It is a form of competitive walking, although it may sound simple but the walkers are judged on the basis of their technique and have to follow strict rules. The race walkers must always have a foot in contact with the ground and their advancing leg must be straightened i.e. not bent at the knee. The violation of these rules leads to disqualification. The most common competitions include 10 km, 20 km and 50 km events.
Athletics in India
The sport was introduced in India during the British Rule and is currently governed by the Athletics Federation of India, which was established in 1946.
The following are India’s major international achievements in Athletics and Para-Athletics:

At the 1900 Summer Olympics, India’s first ever competitor at the games, Norman Pritchard, an Anglo-Indian, won silver medals in the 200 m and 200 m hurdles event. It was 120 years after this achievement that India won an athletics medal at the Olympics when Neeraj Chopra bagged a gold in Javelin Throw at the Tokyo Olympics. He became the first Indian Track and Field athlete to win a gold at the Olympics.
At the debut Asian Games in 1951, India finished second in the athletics medal table.
Milkha Singh popularly known as ‘The Flying Sikh’ was the first Indian athlete to gain success at the global level. He won a 200 m and 400 m event at the 1958 Asian Games before winning the 440 yards title at the British Empire and Commonwealth Games, becoming the first Indian to do so. He finished fourth in the 400 m event at the 1960 Summer Olympics.
Decathlete Gurbachan Singh Randhawa won a gold at the 1962 Asian Games and placed fifth in the 110 m hurdles final at the 1964 Olympics.
PT Usha reached the final of women's 400 m hurdles at the 1984 Summer Olympics, setting an Asian record time in fourth place, and also led the Indian women's 4 × 400 m relay to the final.She went on to win four gold medals at the 1986 Asian Games.
India won its first paralympics medals in 1984, when Joginder Singh Bedi won medals in three throwing events and Bhimrao Kesarkar won a silver in javelin throw.
Long jumper Anju Bobby George won a bronze at the 2002 Commonwealth Games, becoming the first Indian women to do so. She won another bronze at the 2003 World Championships in Athletics in Paris, becoming the first Indian athlete to win a global athletics medal.
Devendra Jhajharia became the nation's first Paralympic athletics champion in 2004 and the second Indian to win a gold in any Paralympic sport.
Krishna Poonia created history by winning women's discus throw event at the 2010 Commonwealth Games, becoming the first Indian to win a Commonwealth athletics gold in 52 years and the first Indian woman to do so.
The 2016 Summer Paralympics proved to be very successful for India, where it’s tally stood at four medals in athletics. Mariyappan Thangavelu (high jump) and Devendra Jhajharia (javelin) won gold, Varun Singh Bhati took bronze in the high jump event and Deepa Malik became India's first female Paralympic medallist with a silver in shot put.

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