How a false start by Chinese athlete Yanni Wu helped Jyothi Yarraji win silver at Asian Games 2023

During the women's 100m hurdles event at the Hangzhou Asian Games, Indian hurdler Jyothi Yarraji initially finished third but her bronze medal was later upgraded to a silver. The controversy arose due to a false start by the Chinese hurdler Yanni Wu, which seemed to prompt Yarraji's reaction. Initially, both Yarraji and Wu were told that they had been disqualified for the false start.

Yarraji and Wu protested the disqualification, and officials reviewed video replays, which clearly showed that Wu had made the false start first and Yarraji had reacted to her. Both athletes were allowed to continue racing, but there was confusion about whether they would be allowed to keep their medals if they won.

Yarraji finished third in the restarted race with a time of 12.91 seconds and was upgraded to the silver medal, with China's Yuwei Lin winning the gold. With protests being lodged, there is still some confusion as to the results of the race.

What is the false start rule in athletics?

In athletics, there's a rule that says if a runner starts running before the race officially begins, they get disqualified. A false start is registered only when an athlete moves faster than 0.1 seconds after the gun is fired.

Currently, a false start results in instant disqualification, but this wasn’t always the case.

There was a slight modification to this rule in 2010. Before, you could make one false start without getting disqualified. A false start by one runner would result in a warning to the entire field, and after that, if any runner made a false start, it would result in disqualification even if they were not the athlete that made the first false start. Now, if you make a false start, you are instantly disqualified.

This rule was changed because it was causing problems with the scheduling of races, making it impossible to keep the preset timings. There are also rumors that some people thought runners were purposely starting early to put pressure on their opponents the second time around.

To know if a false start occurred, the starter shoots the starting gun twice, and then the referee shows a red card to the runner who made the false start.