Today we look at WLBOTT’s track and field team, with a special focus on the shot put.
The shot put is a track and field event involving “putting” (throwing) a heavy spherical ball—the shot—as far as possible. For men, the sport has been a part of the modern Olympics since their revival (1896), and women’s competition began in 1948.
Homer mentions competitions of rock throwing by soldiers during the siege of Troy but there is no record of any weights being thrown in Greek competitions. The first evidence for stone- or weight-throwing events were in the Scottish Highlands, and date back to approximately the first century. In the 16th century King Henry VIII was noted for his prowess in court competitions of weight and hammer throwing.
Tomasz Majewski podczas startu w 2. Memoriale Kamili Skolimowskiej, 20 września 2011 roku w Warszawie. By Kastom – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0
The first events resembling the modern shot put likely occurred in the Middle Ages when soldiers held competitions in which they hurled cannonballs. Shot put competitions were first recorded in early 19th century Scotland, and were a part of the British Amateur Championships beginning in 1866.
The shot must land in the throwing sector, which is a circular sector of 34.92° centered on the throwing circle. The throwing sector has been narrowed multiple times over the years to improve safety, most recently in 2004 from 40°. The current throwing sector angle (34.92°) was chosen because it provides a sector whose bounds are easy to measure and lay out on a field (10 metres out from the center of the ring, 6 metres across).
Natalya Lisovskaya 1987 World & 1988 Olympic Shot Put Champion (outdoor) – U.S.S.R.
22.63 metres (74 feet 3 inches)
Helena Fibingerová (indoor)
22.32 metres on 20 August 1977
Valerie Kasanita Adams
New Zealand shot putter. She is a four-time World champion, four-time World Indoor champion, two-time Olympic, three-time Commonwealth Games champion and twice IAAF Continental Cup winner. She has a personal best throw of 21.24 metres (69.7 ft) outdoors and 20.98 metres (68.8 ft) indoors
Special Recognition for Micheline Ostermeyer
Micheline Ostermeyer was the first women’s Olympic gold medalist for the shot put (1948). She was also a concert pianist!
Micheline Ostermeyer (23 December 1922 – 17 October 2001) was a French athlete and concert pianist. She won three medals at the 1948 Summer Olympics in shot put, discus throw, and high jump. After retiring from sports in 1950, she became a full-time pianist for fifteen years and then turned to teaching afterwards.
A great-niece of the French author Victor Hugo and a niece of the composer Lucien Laroche, Ostermeyer was born in Rang-du-Fliers, Pas-de-Calais. At the insistence of her mother, she began learning piano at the age of 4, and at 14 she left her family’s home in Tunisia to attend the Conservatoire de Paris. After the outbreak of World War II, she moved back to Tunisia where she performed a weekly half-hour piano recital on Radio Tunis.
The 1948 Summer Olympics were Ostermeyer’s finest hour as an athlete. She won gold medals in the shot put and discus throw (despite having picked up a discus for the first time just a few weeks before the event), and a bronze medal in the high jump. She is the first French woman to win an Olympic medal in athletics…. After winning the shot put, Ostermeyer concluded the day with an impromptu performance of a Beethoven concert at her team’s headquarters and a concert at Royal Albert Hall.
Ryan Crouser holds both the indoor and outdoor record.
Ryan Crouser (born December 18, 1992) is an American track and field athlete who competes in the shot put and discus. He specializes in the shot put, in which he is a two-time Olympic gold medalist and a three-time World Champion. He holds the world record in the shot put, both indoors and outdoors. He set the outdoor world record at 23.56 meters in May 2023, improving upon his previous record of 23.37 m from July 2021. He has held the indoor record of 22.82 m since January 2021.
In his early career, Crouser set a national high school record for the indoor shot put and outdoor discus, and he won gold in the shot put at the 2009 World Youth Championships. At the University of Texas at Austin, he won four NCAA titles in the shot put.
