London Olympics Preview: Athletics

With no other sport having such an equal distribution of countries taking part in them, Athletics is quite simply the core of the Olympic Games.

Super Athletes: Yelena Isinbaeva ( RUS ) [ Pole Vault ] , Dai Green ( GBR ) [ 400m hurdles ] , Liu Xiang ( CHN ) [ 110m hurdles ] , Usain Bolt ( JAM ) [ 100m ] , Sally Pearson ( AUS ) [ 100m hurdles ] , Resse Hoffa ( USA ) [ Shot Put ]

Olympic Trivia: The Central American Nation of Panama, on an average sends 2 athletes per Olympics. Panama’s Irving Saladino (Long Jump) won a first ever Gold medal for his country in Beijing 4 years ago!

Asian Story: India were ranked second in terms of the number of medals at the Asiad Athletics 2010 in Guangzhou. As expected China were first. But figure this: China, with just 2 medals to display, were placed a distant 34th in the medals tally at the Olympics in Beijing 2008. The only other nation to feature in the Athletics Medals tally was Japan with a bronze in the 4x100m Men’s relay.

Indian Angle: A number of Indian athletes have qualified for London but only a few are expected to reach the final rounds of their respective events. None are favorites to win medals though. It will be interesting to see how far Vikas Gowda (Discuss) , Om Prakash (Shot Put) and Krishna Poonia (Discuss) throw in London. The 2011 doping scandal cost us our ever improving 4x400m women’s relay team. The girls will be back in 2013 though!

Stars in the Making: Kirani James ( GRN ) [ 400m ] , Mohammed Aman ( ETH ) [ 800m ] , Yohan Blake ( JAM ) [ 100m ] , Ashton Eaton ( USA ) [ Decathlon ] , Darya Klishnia ( RUS ) [ Long Jump ] , David Storl ( GER ) [ Shot Put ]

Sprint (100m , 200m , 100m/110m hurdles):

Mid Distance

Long Distances

Throw

Jump

Road