NCAA championships ain’t the only place they mismeasure throws
On her masters blog, Annette Koop of Germany tells a hoot of a story about a W45 thrower being penalized by a mismarked javelin landing. Not unlike the fate that befell Florida in the team race when a Mason Finley shot put was mismeasured at the NCAA championships in Eugene. My thanks to Stefan Waltermann for this translation: “33 years of participation in the Regionals are enough. With this resolution, Susanne Strohm (*1963, SV Stuttgarter Kickers) spent the weekend in Boeblingen, host town of the regional championships of Baden-Wuerttemberg. It was the location of the only time she had missed reaching the finals in the javelin. She had a score to settle! Eleven of 15 athletes had not even been born when Susanne went to her first regional championships. Nine athletes registered with 39-meter (127-11) throws for the event.â€
Annette continues:
After the first round, Susanne was in seventh place with a throw of 39.18 (128-6).
That was when things turned bizarre. Her second throw, estimated at 38 meters (124-8) was measured 30.78 (101-0). It took the head official to find and correct the error. The event official had turned an 8 into a 0. The third round brought no improvement and the finalists needed to be determined. A distance of 39.97 (131-1) provided the cut-off.
Susanne went ninth and had to watch the rest of the competition. After round six, the head official returned and apologized to Susanne. In the qualifying rounds, a competitor had thrown 33.97 (111-5), but the event official had entered 39.97 (131-1), thus eliminating poor Susanne.
After a discussion of the facts, Susanne was offered to throw three more times in the men’s javelin competition. It took an hour before the first throw. Needless to say that by that time her energy and motivation were gone. It turned into a better training session for her — no improvements possible in her very last competition on the regional stage.
Still, Susanne Strohm has the distinction to be the only known woman to throw in men’s javelin competitions at the regional level. And she got even with Boeblingen. She was in the finals. Now, the masters athlete wants to throw over 40 meters (131-3) in 2010. That would mark 30 consecutive years of throwing over 40 meters!
3 Responses
The number of participants is a bit lower than 2008 Ljubljana (3695) and seriously lower than Potsdam 2002 (4385), but about the same as Poznan 2006 (3057). See http://www.evaa.ch/records-a-statistics/90-european-veteran-championship-records-1978-2006-.html
It will be my third Eurovets after Potsdam 2002 and Aarhus 2004. Looking back I see the zigzaging of my career, with high jump as only constant factor. In Potsdam I also did the pentathlon and triple jump, but injuries made me skip those disciplines. In Aarhus I did the hammer throw just for fun. In 2005 I became a javelin thrower, so in NyÃregyháza it are my first and second love of the moment, high jump and javelin throw. Looking forward to meet all those colleagues! (And beat them…)
Unfortunately, mis-measurements happen far too often in the throws and jumps! However, based on human error, it is very easy to see how mistakes can be made in the field events and even with the recording of hand times. This is probably due to the large number of varibles come into play.
Sadly, I have experienced all of the scenarios listed below at open, college, masters, and all-comer meets.
1. The throw is not properly marked.
2. The measurment is made incorrectly.
3. The official calls out the wrong distance.
4. The official records the wrong distance.
5. The official fails to circle the best mark.
6. The person transfering the mark from the flight sheet to the final results transposes a number.
It will happen as long as human beings make judgment calls in sports. People make mistakes. It’s part of the game. I appreciate the hard work of the officials. It is exhausting work, and they do the best they can.
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