Swiss pole vaulter Angelica Moser (© Sona Maleter)
A range of new competition formats were put to the test at the Track Lab – a World Athletics Continental Tour Silver meeting – in the Swiss city of Fribourg on Sunday (1).
The Track Lab Fribourg featured a variety of athletics disciplines. Some, such as the mile steeplechase, were completely new. Others had minor adjustments made, such as in the sprints where the allowed reaction time was reduced to 0.000 instead of 0.10. While a few – like the 800m – were unchanged.
The field events, meanwhile, were trialling more significant changes. The pole vault was held as a mixed competition where the absolute effective height over the bar was measured. The long jump had a 40-centimetre long take-off zone, from which the full distance jumped was measured. And in the javelin, an athlete's throw was only measured and recorded if it was an improvement on their previous best.
All of these new formats were being tested for the first time and form part of a consultation process for the future of the sport to see if such changes can enhance the enjoyment and excitement of a competition. Further testing and consultation with various stakeholders will be undertaken in the aftermath of this event. Anything that doesn't pass extensive consultation will not be implemented.
Aside from the tweaks to the disciplines, there was also a team element to the competition.
Fans at home were able to benefit too, as the live stream tested out filming angles shot by drones that had never been used for live coverage before.
European pole vault champion Angelica Moser, competing on home soil, received a great welcome from the Swiss crowd. She cleared a best of 4.47m to finish second overall in her event, and the leading woman, behind compatriot Fabio Kissling.
Ethiopia’s Abrham Sime was a convincing winner of the mile steeplechase, clocking 4:14.36 to finish comfortably ahead of Nicolas-Marie Daru of France.
World bronze medallist Alina Rotaru-Kottmann of Romania produced the best long jump of the day, leaping 6.64m to finish five centimetres ahead of Slovenia’s Neja Filipic. With athletes taking off from a 40-centimetre take-off zone, all 18 jumps in the competition were valid and measured.
Two-time world champion Anderson Peters won a javelin contest in which throws were only measured and recorded if they were an improvement on a previous throw. The Grenadian opened with 74.52m, then extended his lead with 78.78m in round two before finishing with 81.18m in the third and final round.
He was part of the triumphant ‘Team Black’ that won the overall team contest. Dutch sprint hurdler Nadine Visser was another winner on that team, taking the women’s 100m hurdles in 12.67 from Australia’s Liz Clay (12.82).
Elsewhere, Switzerland’s Audrey Werro won the women’s 800m in 1:58.79 to win by more than a second, while Dylan Borlee took the men’s 400m in 45.87 in a race in which Brazilian 400m hurdles Alison dos Santos placed third (46.07).