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Dick Fosbury
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Dick Fosbury
Richard Douglas Fosbury (March 6, 1947 – March 12, 2023) was an American high jumper, who is considered one of the most influential athletes in the history of track and field. He won a gold medal at the 1968 Summer Olympics, revolutionizing the high jump event with a "back-first" technique now known as the Fosbury flop. His method was to sprint diagonally towards the bar, then curve and leap backward over it, which gave him a much lower center of mass in flight than traditional techniques. Debbie Brill was developing her similar "Brill Bend" around the same time. This approach has seen nearly universal adoption since Fosbury's performance in Mexico. Though he never returned to the Olympics, Fosbury continued to be involved in athletics after retirement and served on the executive board of the World Olympians Association.
In 2014, Fosbury challenged Steve Miller for a seat in the Idaho House of Representatives, but was unsuccessful. Fosbury ran for Blaine County Commissioner against incumbent Larry Schoen in 2018, won the seat, and took office in 2019.
Born in Portland, Oregon, Fosbury started experimenting with a new high-jumping technique at age 16, while attending Medford High School. Fosbury had difficulty competing using the dominant high-jumping techniques of the period. In his second year, he failed to complete jumps of five feet (1.52 m), the qualifying height for many high-school track meets. This dominant technique, the straddle method, was a complex motion where an athlete went over the high-jump bar facing down, and lifted their legs individually over the bar. Fosbury found it difficult to coordinate all the motions involved in the straddle method, so he began to experiment with other ways of doing the high jump.
Fosbury later recalled, "I knew I had to change my body position and that's what started first the revolution, and over the next two years, the evolution." At first, he tried to use a technique known as the upright scissors method. In this method, a jumper runs upright towards the bar, facing forward, and during their jump lifts their straight legs one at a time over the bar. High-jump rules stipulate only that competitors must jump off one foot at takeoff; there is no rule governing how a competitor crosses the bar, so long as they go over it.
As he began to experiment with this technique, he gradually adapted it to make himself more comfortable and to get more height out of it. Nonetheless, it was nowhere near as coordinated as a well-performed straddle method jump, and one historian[who?] has referred to Fosbury's early attempts as an "airborne seizure". However, during the latter part of his second year and the beginning of his junior year, it started to produce results, and he gradually was able to clear higher jumps.
Gradually, Fosbury shifted his positioning during the jump, such that by his senior year he had begun to go over the bar backward, head-first, curving his body over the bar and kicking his legs up in the air at the end of the jump. This required him to land on his back, but, prior to his junior year, his high school had replaced its wood chip landing pit with a softer material, so he was able to land safely.
Luckily for Fosbury, replacement of landing surfaces with foam rubber was becoming common across the United States in the early 1960s. Sawdust, sand, or woodchip surfaces had been usable previously because jumpers using the scissors technique were able to clear the bar while upright and then land on their feet, and those using the Western Roll or Straddle made a three-point landing on their hands and lead leg. In the late 1950s, U.S. colleges began to use bundles of soft foam rubber, usually held together by a mesh net. These bundles were not only much softer, but raised the landing height about three feet (0.91 m) off the ground. By the early 1960s, U.S. high schools were following the lead of the colleges in acquiring foam rubber landing pits. With the softer, elevated landing surface, Fosbury was able to land safely.
Fosbury did, however, compress a couple of vertebrae in the mid-1960s because not all high schools could afford the upgraded, foam material. Fosbury recovered from this injury.
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Dick Fosbury
Richard Douglas Fosbury (March 6, 1947 – March 12, 2023) was an American high jumper, who is considered one of the most influential athletes in the history of track and field. He won a gold medal at the 1968 Summer Olympics, revolutionizing the high jump event with a "back-first" technique now known as the Fosbury flop. His method was to sprint diagonally towards the bar, then curve and leap backward over it, which gave him a much lower center of mass in flight than traditional techniques. Debbie Brill was developing her similar "Brill Bend" around the same time. This approach has seen nearly universal adoption since Fosbury's performance in Mexico. Though he never returned to the Olympics, Fosbury continued to be involved in athletics after retirement and served on the executive board of the World Olympians Association.
In 2014, Fosbury challenged Steve Miller for a seat in the Idaho House of Representatives, but was unsuccessful. Fosbury ran for Blaine County Commissioner against incumbent Larry Schoen in 2018, won the seat, and took office in 2019.
Born in Portland, Oregon, Fosbury started experimenting with a new high-jumping technique at age 16, while attending Medford High School. Fosbury had difficulty competing using the dominant high-jumping techniques of the period. In his second year, he failed to complete jumps of five feet (1.52 m), the qualifying height for many high-school track meets. This dominant technique, the straddle method, was a complex motion where an athlete went over the high-jump bar facing down, and lifted their legs individually over the bar. Fosbury found it difficult to coordinate all the motions involved in the straddle method, so he began to experiment with other ways of doing the high jump.
Fosbury later recalled, "I knew I had to change my body position and that's what started first the revolution, and over the next two years, the evolution." At first, he tried to use a technique known as the upright scissors method. In this method, a jumper runs upright towards the bar, facing forward, and during their jump lifts their straight legs one at a time over the bar. High-jump rules stipulate only that competitors must jump off one foot at takeoff; there is no rule governing how a competitor crosses the bar, so long as they go over it.
As he began to experiment with this technique, he gradually adapted it to make himself more comfortable and to get more height out of it. Nonetheless, it was nowhere near as coordinated as a well-performed straddle method jump, and one historian[who?] has referred to Fosbury's early attempts as an "airborne seizure". However, during the latter part of his second year and the beginning of his junior year, it started to produce results, and he gradually was able to clear higher jumps.
Gradually, Fosbury shifted his positioning during the jump, such that by his senior year he had begun to go over the bar backward, head-first, curving his body over the bar and kicking his legs up in the air at the end of the jump. This required him to land on his back, but, prior to his junior year, his high school had replaced its wood chip landing pit with a softer material, so he was able to land safely.
Luckily for Fosbury, replacement of landing surfaces with foam rubber was becoming common across the United States in the early 1960s. Sawdust, sand, or woodchip surfaces had been usable previously because jumpers using the scissors technique were able to clear the bar while upright and then land on their feet, and those using the Western Roll or Straddle made a three-point landing on their hands and lead leg. In the late 1950s, U.S. colleges began to use bundles of soft foam rubber, usually held together by a mesh net. These bundles were not only much softer, but raised the landing height about three feet (0.91 m) off the ground. By the early 1960s, U.S. high schools were following the lead of the colleges in acquiring foam rubber landing pits. With the softer, elevated landing surface, Fosbury was able to land safely.
Fosbury did, however, compress a couple of vertebrae in the mid-1960s because not all high schools could afford the upgraded, foam material. Fosbury recovered from this injury.
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