Athletics of To-Day 1929

Athletics of To-day athlete is fighting to combat the resistance due to the attraction of gravity. After the point His passed gravity will assist the athlete to increase the length of his jinnp, provided his own centre of gravity continues to follow the true path of the parabola. The problem that all athletes have long been seeking to solve is that of preventing the heavy upper part of the body from coming forward as momentum is lost and so disposing the weight forward and thus forcing the legs to earth earlier than they should reach the sand-pit. It has been stated, and truly so, I think, that no explosive "hitch-kick," running step, or any other unsupported mid-air movement of any nature whatsoever can add to the velocity of the body once it has been projected from the take-off board by the impulse generated in the speed of the run-up and the power of the spring. And yet athlet shave proved the practicability of prolonging the flight of the body from take-off to landing through the introduction into the jump of certain mid-air evolutions. This prolongation of flight depends entirely upon the timing and the proper execution of the "hitch-kick," or running step in mid-air, at the highest point in the parabola of flight. At the point H in the curve AD (Fig. r7) the force of the initial impulse is facing def at, and from that point to the point of landing the force of gravity b gins to ov rcome the athlete's powers of r sistance. If at that stage he allows his weight to go forward his 1 gs will b for ed down and he will land in the sand-pit som where b twe n E and D, inst ad of getting full value for his speed and spring which should carry him on to D. The first part of the trick is summ d up in the one word "hang." This same "hang" of the push-off leg has, as we know, already played an important part in both the high jump and high hurdl s. Th long jumper, th n, is at top speed as he approach s the tak -off b ard on which h stamps the jumping foot down hard and flat and concentrat s all his will-pow r into g tting h ight into the jump as his centre of gravity pass s ov r his jumping 1 g (see No. I, Plate 28). Full use is made of the arms and