Coaching and Care of Athletes

COACHING AND CARE OF ATHLETES secs. for 400 metres (over ten flights of 3-ft. hurdles), which IS less than 3 yds. short of the full 440 yds. And now we come to the most amazing record-breaking of all, which has taken pla<;e in that branch of athletics generically termed 'field events.' In I90I P.J. O'Connor, oflreland (Plate VI, Fig. 16, and Plate IX, Fig.' 28), set the record for the broad jump at 24ft. I r! ins. This was nearly equalled in I9I2 by Albert Gutterson, U.S.A., who jumped 24 ft. I r! ins. to win the Olympic championship at Stockholm. No man, however, passed the 25-ft. mark until Ed. Gourdin, an American negro, cleared 25 ft. 3 ins. in 192r. In I928 S. Cator, a negro, of Haiti, jumped 26 ft. t in. In I93I 26ft. 2! ins. was reached by the diminutive Japanese Chuhuei Nambu. Even his feat has since been eclipsed by J esse Owens, who in 1935 created his fourth world's record when he jumped 26 ft. 8! ins., to set up a broad jump record which suggests that even 27 ft. is not beyond the limit of human possibility. Nambu was at one time the holder also of the world's hop, step, and jump record. Until I924 the hop, step, and jump record of 50 ft. I I ins. had stood to the credit of Dan Ahearne, an Irish– American who jumped that distance in I9II. At the Olympic Games in I924 Ahearne's record was beaten by a quarter of an inch by A. W. Winter, ofAustralia. At the Olympic Games held at Los Angeles in I932 Nambu increased the record surprisingly to 51 ft. 7 ins., but even that performance was destined to go by the board, for J. P. Metcalfe, Australia, did 51 ft. 9! ins. in I935, and at the I936 Olympic Games N. Tajima, ofjapa11,jumped 52ft. 5t ins. Then there ·is that fine old natural sport high jumping. In I876, when the Hon. M. J. Brooks, of Oxford University (Plate X, Fig. 34), established the Inter-University record of6 ft. 2t ins., the old Scottish professional all-round athlete Donald Dinnie wrote to The Field seeking to show on a priori grounds that it was impossible for any human being to exceed, or even reach, the height of 6 ft. One wonders what old Donald would have said had he lived to hear of the present world's record! As early as I895 a small Irish– American: athlete named Sweeney discovered a style which enabled him to clear 6 ft. 5~ ins., and in I9I2 George Horine, also an American, discovered yet another method, which enabled him to jump 6 ft. 7 ins. This record was soon eclipsed by Dr E. E. Beeson, U.S.A., who copied Horine's style. This was great jumping, but in 1936 two American negroes, 22