Why? The Science of Athletics

DIAGRAM AND DEDUCTIONAL CALCULATION 235 in his senior year, I 924, he made his world's record mark of 6 ft. 8 I/4 ins., besides winning the Olympic Decathlon with a new world's record point score. Osborn's high jump record was due to stand for ten · years ; but meanwhile George Spitz, known as the "Back Yard Boy Jumper" because his father had taught him first-rate style in their small back-yard, came along. Six feet tall, I62 lb. in weight, I7 years old, and still at Flushing High School, U.S.A., this young marvel cleared 6ft. 4 I/2 ins. I mention Spitz because, in indoor competition, he went a quarter of an inch higher than Osborn's out– door record and used the Eastern Cut-off style, with which 6 I /2ft. had never before been beaten. And still it seems probable that the last word in high jump .record breaking has not been said ; German athletic scientists are already perfecting a new method, or rather an adaptatiop of the Eastern style, which they call the New Scissors Jump. Its principle is shown in Figs. 6o and 6I, Plate I6, by Douglas Shetliffe, and its essence lies in the claim that while the jumper's body is pq.ssing over the bar his centre of gravity passes beneath it. (See· Fig. 9I Plate 20, and for fuller explanation read Chapter XVI carefully.) Nor is that all, for my friend Gerald Ayers, coach to the Indian Empire Olympic Team, tells me of a new method he is trying out ; but, in point of fact, it has many similar points to a style I tried away back about I909 and in which I got to within a quarter of an inch of 6 ft. (Fig. 63, Plate I 6). In Ayers's new style the jumper, assuming he takes his spring from the right foot, makes his approach from the right at an angle of 45 degrees and brings his take-off spot in as close as twenty inches in front of the bar, which surely is an innovation. At the end of a loose, easy approach run, the take-off foot hits the ground very hard, heel and ball striking simultaneously, and the left leg swings through as if about