World Athletics scraps landing zone idea to avoid 'all-out war' with long jump athletes

Carl Lewis called the take-off one idea an "April Fool’s joke".

The wide take-off zone was intended to reduce the number of foul jumps. Pic: Sam Barnes/Sportsfile

World Athletics has scrapped controversial plans to introduce a take-off zone for the long jump rather than the traditional board because of widespread hostility from athletes, the Guardian can reveal.

Jon Ridgeon, World Athletics’ chief executive, said that while the proposals had trialled well, “ultimately you do not want to go to war with your most important group of people”.

The idea of introducing a wide take-off zone was to reduce the number of foul jumps because athletes would no longer be required to try to hit a narrow board before jumping into the sand pit.

However, the Olympic long jump champion Miltiadis Tentoglou described the proposal as “dog shit” because it took much of the skill out of the event, while Carl Lewis called it an “April Fool’s joke”.

“The reality is the athletes do not want to embrace it,” Ridgeon admitted. “So we’re not going to do it. You ultimately don’t go to war with your most important group of people, right?

“So even though I would argue we identified a problem, and found a viable solution, if the athletes don’t want it, fine, we drop it. But I don’t regret looking at that. I think that’s our job as the governing body.”

World Athletics trialled the idea earlier this year after research found that around a third of long jumps at championships were no jumps, and that reduced the interest of fans.

“Absolutely from the emotional reaction of the crowd, they lose energy with no jumps. So we said, ‘Can we solve that exam question?’ And so we created the concept of a wider take-off zone’. We trialled that solution, and it actually trialled well.” When it was tested at two events earlier this year, World Athletics found that the number of no jumps dropped to just 13% and spectators enjoyed the new format. However, most of the sport’s stars remained impeccably opposed. But Ridgeon insisted that World Athletics had no regrets for attempting to improve the event.

“In fact, I think we would be accused of being asleep at the wheel if we didn’t look for weaknesses,” he added. “The long jump’s a really exciting and vibrant part of our sport. But I think it’s our job to push the boundaries and say, ‘look, can we make something that’s already good even better?’ That’s what we try to do.

“Where I was slightly frustrated is that everyone just jumped on that one thing, when we were looking at four or five things to improve and speed up the long jump.

“They include simple things like getting the officials to rake the pit quicker. We’re also working with Seiko to create a concept called instant results. So when you land in a sandpit at the moment, it might take up to 20 seconds to get the result. We’re working on less than five seconds.”

Guardian