Every child more or less voluntarily comes into contact with athletics as a school sport. Once a year, students can demonstrate their athletic skills at the Bundesjugendspiele. Athletics usually meets with only moderate enthusiasm among school children – although it has always been the supreme discipline at the Olympics. The first Olympic Games that can be documented today took place in 776 BC – with only one discipline, the 192-meter stadium run. In the process, Stone Age people already measured their physical abilities, for example in the form of races.
Athletics: versatile and time-honored
The athletics competition of the modern era celebrated its birth on March 5, 1864, in England. On that day, teams from Oxford and Cambridge universities competed against each other. Just two years later, the first national athletics competition was held, with twelve disciplines. By the time the first modern Olympic Games were held in Athens in 1896, track and field had spread around the world and remains a core Olympic sport today.
Track and field is actually a collective term for various disciplines of running, jumping and throwing. These disciplines have undergone many changes over time. Today, the Olympic Games feature 24 disciplines for men and 23 for women. Although there are also non-Olympic track and field disciplines – the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF), the governing body of national track and field federations, founded in 1912, only recognizes standardized running courses for world records.
Decathlon and heptathlon for all-rounders
Track and field training in childhood is still very broad. However, depending on preferences and talents, emphasis is placed on young people. For all-rounders, the decathlon is a good choice for men and the heptathlon for women. Athletes in these disciplines must have great versatility and endurance. Both competitions are held on two consecutive days.
The decathlon consists of four running events (100m, 400m, 1500m and 110m hurdles), three throwing events (shot put, discus and javelin) and three jumping events (long jump, high jump and pole vault). The heptathlon consists of three running disciplines (200m, 800m and 100m hurdles), two throwing disciplines (shot put and javelin) and two jumping disciplines (high jump and long jump).
Athletics: injuries and risks
Extraneous injuries, as in team sports, are uncommon in track and field. Because track and field is such a versatile sport, you can’t really talk about typical track and field injuries. Instead, you have to differentiate according to the various disciplines, because the focus of training is also quite different here. Nevertheless, in general, in order to avoid injuries, all track and field athletes should take care to protect their joints. Training sessions also include strength and endurance training.
It is especially important to do a thorough warm-up workout specifically targeting the muscles that are frequently used to prevent bruises, cramps and strains. A strong trunk and well-trained arms and legs are the basic requirements for a successful track and field athlete. Most injuries in athletics occur in connection with overtiredness and overloading, and technical errors can also be the cause. In the following, we briefly present the most important disciplines and their specific injury risks.
