Olympic News : Athletics

One of the most popular sports that will feature at the London 2012 Olympic Games is also the biggest: Athletics features 2,000 athletes running, walking, jumping and throwing for gold. The athletics motto 'faster, higher and stronger' is the perfect advert for athletics at the summer games. The competition requires athletes to run faster, throw further, jump higher and leap longer than their rivals. There are four main strands to the Athletics competition: track events, such as the 100m; field events, which include the High Jump and the Shot Put; combined events such as the Decathlon, a mix of track and field elements; and road events, among them the Marathon. Staged in the brand new Olympic Stadium, the 24 track events (12 for men, 12 for women) will be held over distances ranging from 100m to 10,000m. There will be five road events on the Athletics programme at the London 2012 Olympic Games: the men’s and women’s Marathons (12 and 5 August respectively), the men’s and women’s 20km Race Walks (4 and 11 August respectively), and the men’s 50km Race Walk (11 August). The 16 field events fall into two categories: four throwing events for both men and women, namely the Shot Put, Javelin, Discus and Hammer, and four jumping events, also for both men and women. In the High Jump and the Pole Vault, athletes aim to jump higher than their rivals; in the Long Jump and Triple Jump, they try to jump further. Finally, there are the two combined events: Decathlon for men and Heptathlon for women.

Key facts

Venue: Olympic Stadium – Olympic Park (track, field and combined events); The Mall (road events)
Dates: Friday 3 August – Sunday 12 August
Medal events: 47
Athletes: 2,000