Tag: discus

“May the wind…”

The Diamond League made the announcement last week that several events would no longer be contested in their program for the 2020 season: the 200m, the 3000m steeple chase, the triple jump, and the discus. You read that right… the discus. There is some primal human instinct we have in our very soul to want to throw stuff. The discus is a tool gifted to us by the ancient Greeks to liberate that instinct. It is poetry in motion. A symbol of strength and power, yet also finesse and artistry. The Diamond League’s decision is an affront to our human nature.

Even though I love the throws, I enjoy and appreciate that there’s a certain kind of beauty in any event in track and field. When I’m not watching the throws, I particularly enjoy the pole vault and the high jump. As I see it, the high jump and the pole vault have two big positives that make the events notably fan-friendly:

  1. Binary, immediate result – Either the bar stays up, or it falls down. Simple.
  2. Progressively more exciting – The bar keeps getting raised. The most exciting attempts will always happen at the end of the competition.

The format of these events lends itself to being able to anticipate when the most exciting moments will happen. Because the events eliminate competitors as a competition progresses, duels between evenly matched athletes can create an intense atmosphere for the last few bars. In the greater throwing world, we have two competitions that follow a very similar format to this, and both come from the Highland Games: the weight over bar and the sheaf toss.

56 lb Weight over Bar
Sheaf Toss (20 lb)

I suppose my main thought is this – why did an event like the weight over bar or the sheaf toss never make its way from the highland games into the sport of track and field? The shot put and the hammer throw originated from events in the highland games. The 56 pound weight for distance was an event at the 1904 and 1924 Olympics, and the 35 pound weight throw is an event that is contested in the NCAA indoor season. But why did an elimination-style throwing for height event never make its way into track and field? If an elimination-style throwing for height event was in track and field, would the format of the event popularize and save it, or would the powers that be still want to marginalize and push the big guys to the side?

I don’t know or have any of the answers to those questions, but while organizing bodies want to change the sport of track and field through elimination, I can’t help but think that throwing will find a way to innovate, move on, and even grow. It feels like the throws have an incredible amount of momentum in the USA and globally at the moment. There was a group for discus throwers in the early days of Facebook called “Fluat ventus ob vultum,” which translates from Latin as “May the wind flow into your face.” Well, the IAAF seems to be trying to deliver the discus community a strong headwind going into the future. I’m hoping the throws community figures out some way to use it. RH

Community

At the K-State Invitational 2014. L to R – Jason York, Greg Watson, Ryan Hershberger (myself), and Alex Roe

In the summers of 2011 and 2012, there were maybe two or three weight throw pentathlons that were hosted among college throwers in the state of Kansas. We hosted one or two at Kansas State, when the coach at that time, Steve Fritz, was hoping to qualify for the master’s world championships in the weight throw pentathlon. It was just a time that we were all able to get together, toss around heavy stuff, and at the end of the day have some barely edible pizza from the college town staple – Pizza Shuttle (described by an official one year as “cardboard with ketchup on top”). Even though we might have all gotten together to have a good time, make no mistake that these were still events where we wore our pride on our sleeves. One year, at a fall weight throw pentathlon at Wichita State, a couple of guys that I regularly beat during the collegiate season nearly edged me out in the shot put. I realized just how out of shape I was after a summer of barely throwing at all, and you can bet that when I returned to practice the next week there was a new sense of urgency in my training.

Quoting from the Online Etymology Dictionary:

compete (v.) 1610s, “to enter or be put in rivalry with,” from Middle French compéter “be in rivalry with” (14c.), or directly from Late Latin competere “strive in common, strive after something in company with or together,” in classical Latin “to meet or come together; agree or coincide; to be qualified,” from com “with, together” (see com-) + petere “to strive, seek, fall upon, rush at, attack” (from PIE root *pet- “to rush, to fly”)

It is noteworthy that both compete and community share the root “com” meaning “with or together.” Some people may choose to focus on the “strive” or “attack” element of competition. But without others to compete against, there is no context for the struggle. Whether it’s a dozen college students getting together to throw against each other, or all the nations in the world coming together at the Olympics, competition engenders a strong community aspect.

I really wish that we had continued holding those weight throw pentathlons from college. Maybe that’s something to continue in the future. But hopefully we can afford a little bit better pizza. RH