Athletics of To-Day 1929

Some Points in Athletic Science 345 does not compare favourably with the smoothness of many a secondary school field. In America there are wonderful in– door tracks; the outdoor cinder paths are the fastest in the world, with the possible exception of the Olympic stadium at Stockholm; and, moreover, the American are so well catered for that, when the weather makes the ground sodden, board tracks, run-ways, and jumping fans are put down, in order that the athletes may continue practising. ( ee late 6z.) Th lat James Sullivan sought to explain Am rica's greatness on the grounds that the national game of ba eball engenders all the qualities an athlete needs. But that does not xplain the phenomenon, for th combination of Briti h gam s-cricket, football under b th cod s, and hock y- must be at 1 a t as good, while the candinavians had produc d world-beat r in athletics before ever th y t ok seriously tot am games. In any case we must be dealing in inv r ratio when we talk of building athletic efficiency upon any t am gam , since the natural actions of running, jumping, and throwing must provide the fundamental basis of all other forms of sport. The real explanation is that Am rica's first-class professional coaches hit upon an 1 m ntary sequ nee principle that the science of under tanding things i , first, observation, and secondly, noting the r lati n existing b b een on thing and another. Henc their x llent sy t m of teaching has been volved. Th early pion ers of sci ntific instruction studied "effect," they had a dim compr hen ion of "caus ," but they did not envisage the third factor, which is the proof of the connection betw en any two, or more, actions by quantitive measurement. Paavo urmi, Finland, revolutionised modern distance running by setting him lf to maintain an ven pace throughout his races. One wond rs why, and h w, he hit upon this principle? That it is a corr et on can, of course, be prov d sci ntifically, while r f s or Kenn lly, of ost n, U..A., has sugge ted that more than one distance running record might be brok n with the aid of a m hanical pacen1aker, travelling at a constant speed and o adjusted that the runner, by ke ping up