Athletics and Football (extract)

I I 6 ATHLETICS smallest fractoiof nt,he power required to lift them over the hurdle. Running is nothing if not natural, and graceful as hurdling is, in our opinioint has been brought to too high a pitch of artificiality. We have seeHn. KU.pcher, one of the best othf e Oxforhdurdlers, take two spinsover hurdlews,hen in each sphinis feeftell in exactly the same tr ck (and we may add the same part of his shin scraped the top of the hurdle in exactly the samsepot), tshoat a Red Indian following him by his trackswould hardly have seen that he had been twice over the same ground. The hurdle-racer must, waes have seen, havelightfoot, and so he is rarely a heav man, but he must also have a strong back and thighs, aso to take his spring and his fresh start without any pause. Thus he is always one who runs in a ' springy' style, but a good high jumper is rarely of any use as hurdler, heashas a natural inclination to jump too high and wastieme hinis spring into the air. Hurdle-racing and long-jumping ability more often go together. Indeed, the main point in hurdle-racing is not to learn to jump well over the hurdle, but to learn not to jump too high. The best way to attain this is, in our opinion, to practise over hurdles the top bar of which is loose. It may seem a paradox, but we think it is true, that the runner can best learn by having no fear of coming to grief by crashing into the top bar. Upcher, of whom we have spoken, probably took as much care over his practicfeor hurdling as any manhas evedr one, and so fearful was he of getting into the habit of rising too high, that when he began, whether the hurdles had a loose top or not, he would crash through half-a-dozen of them, leaving a track of desolation behind him. His shins cer­ tainly suffered in the performance, as he was in the habit sometimes of carefully bumping them against each hurdle to see that he was going all right. The hurdlestahte OlMd arston running-grounds at Oxford, over which so many cracpkrsac­ tised, hlaodose tops whicchame wofhfen strucbky the leg, but recently the Oxonians have practised over ordinary hurdles,