Portal:Sport of athletics

Athletics is a group of sporting events that involves competitive running, jumping and throwing. The most common types of athletics competitions are track and field, road running, cross-country running, and race walking.

The results of racing events are decided by finishing position (or time, where measured), while the jumps and throws are won by the athlete that achieves the highest or furthest measurement from a series of attempts. The simplicity of the competitions, and the lack of a need for expensive equipment, makes athletics one of the most common types of sports in the world. Athletics is mostly an individual sport, with the exception of relay races and competitions which combine athletes' performances for a team score, such as cross country.

Organized athletics are traced back to the ancient Olympic Games from 776 BC. The rules and format of the modern events in athletics were defined in Western Europe and North America in the 19th and early 20th century, and were then spread to other parts of the world. Most modern top level meetings are held under the auspices of World Athletics, the global governing body for the sport of athletics, or its member continental and national federations. (Full article...)

Masters athletics is a class of the sport of athletics for athletes of 35 years of age and over, governed by World Masters Athletics. The events include track and field, road running and cross country running. Competitors are bracketed into five-year age groups (which promotes fair competition). For international events the first age group is 35 to 39. Men as old as 105 and women in their 100s have competed in running, jumping and throwing events. Masters athletes are sometimes known as "veterans" and the European Masters Championships, for instance, is known as "Eurovets". This and other high level events including biennial World Championships cater largely to elite-level athletes, but many masters athletes are novices to athletics and enjoy the camaraderie offered by masters competition at the local, National and International level. Most National governing bodies for track and field hold annual Masters championships. Prestigious National meets such as the Penn Relays and the United States Olympic Trials (track and field) put on exhibition events for top masters athletes. Masters athletics is growing Internationally with over 6000 athletes competing at recent World Championships. World; National and Regional records are maintained for each age group.

In India the Masters Athletics Federation of India conducts National Masters Athletics Championships every year. In the United States, USATF (USA Track & Field) hosts various Masters events including National Championships for Indoor and Outdoor Track & Field and Cross Country. USATF adds the age divisions 30–34 as Sub-Masters, and 25–29 as Pre-Masters to give athletes just past college age more opportunities to compete. (Full article...)

16 February:

• Grit Breuer, German sprinter
• Fermín Cacho, Spasnish middle-distance runner
• Robert Emmiyan, Soviet long jumper
• Vala Flosadóttir, Icelandic pole vaulter
• Tia Hellebaut, Belgian high jumper
• Cathy Freeman, Australian sprinter
• Susanna Kallur, Swedish hurdler
• Lon Myers, American sprinter and middle-distance runner
• Yekaterina Volkova, Russian steeplechase runner
• Zamira Zaytseva, Soviet middle-distance runner
• Dong Yanmei, Chinese distance runner
• Valentina Yegorova, Russian distance runner

• ... that 1985 NCAA hurdling champion Thomas Wilcher won the Michigan High School Athletic Association team track & field championship three consecutive times, both as an athlete and a coach?
• ... that Charlie Fonville broke a 14-year-old shot put world record by almost twelve inches at the 1948 Kansas Relays but was not allowed to stay with the other athletes because he was African-American?
• ... that the Peachtree Road Race, held annually on July 4 (U.S. Independence Day) in Atlanta, Georgia, is the world's largest 10 kilometer road race with 55,000 runners participating in 2007?
• ... that Patrick Ivuti's photo finish victory in the 2007 Chicago Marathon, one of the five major marathons, was his first marathon victory?

2016 Australian Paralympic team portrait of Proudfoot

Katherine Proudfoot (born 21 April 1977 in Auckland, New Zealand) is a cerebral palsy athlete from Australia competing mainly in throwing events. She competed in the F36 classification at the 2008, 2012 and the 2016 Summer Paralympics, winning medals at each Game. Following a medical review request in early 2017, she now competes in seated throws in the F32 classification. At the 2017 Australian Athletics Championships she threw 7.04m in the Women's Shot Put Secured event, bettering the Women's F32 shot put world record mark of 6.55m. (Full article...)

• ... that the teams of five countries set seven national records during a women's 4 × 400 metres relay event in 2024?
• ... that Liechtensteiner athlete Oskar Ospelt was a two-time Swiss national champion?
• ... that Nahuel Carabaña turned around mid-race at the 2022 European Athletics Championships to help an injured competitor?
• ... that the "fall and rise of Femke Bol" refers to her fall in the mixed 4 × 400 m relay followed by her world title in the 400 metres hurdles?
• ... that Mokulubete Makatisi placed eighth at the 2022 Commonwealth Games women's marathon despite running in new shoes that she had received on the eve of the race?
• ... that a 400-metre race in 2025 was won by Lieke Klaver, who pretended that an absent competitor was running in front of her?
• ... that Libania Grenot was the first woman in three decades to successfully defend the European 400-metres title?
• ... that Femke Bol won the women's 400 metres hurdles at the 2024 European Athletics Championships in a championship record of 52.49 seconds?

• WikiProject Athletics
• WikiProject Sports
• WikiProject Running

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