As the countdown to this summer’s Olympic Games in Paris continues, long jumpers worldwide will be keenly eyeing a proposed rule change by World Athletics to curtail the volume of failed jumps in championships.
World Athletics, the governing body for global track field, has proposed to replace the jump board with a “Take Off Zone,” where jumps with an athlete’s foot crossing the line will be registered as a legal attempt.
World Athletics CEO Jon Ridgeon shared the news while speaking on the Anything But Footy podcast.
“It will mean that every jump counts,“ Ridgeon said, adding, “It adds to the jeopardy and the drama of the competition.”
According to Ridgeon, the proposed change intends to reduce the number of foul jumps in the event. In making his case, he noted that a third of all jumps at last summer’s World Championships in Budapest were “no jumps” after stepping over the line in pursuit of the perfect take-off.
“That doesn’t work, that is a waste of time,“ he added. “So we are testing at the moment a take-off zone, rather than a board. But at the same time we are trying to work out ways of getting instant results so that you don’t have to wait 20 or 30 seconds before the result pops up, and how we speed up the whole thing.”
While the idea, Ridgeon says, is to aid the performances of the discipline, he notes the expected pushback of the proposal.
“You cannot make change in a sport that was basically invented 150 years ago without some controversy,” he said.
“If you have dedicated your life to hitting that take-off board perfectly and then suddenly we replace it with a take-off zone, I totally get that there might be initial resistance. “We will spend this year testing it in real-life circumstances with very good athletes. If it doesn’t pass testing, we will never introduce it. We are not going to introduce things on a whim.”
At least one noted figure in athletics has already criticised the concept. Four-time Olympic long jump champion Carl Lewis chided the adaption as a joke in response on Twitter.
“You’re supposed to wait until 1 April for April Fools jokes. I guess it supports what I’ve been saying, that the long is the most difficult event in track and field. That would just eliminate the most difficult skill from the event.”
