Athletic Track & Field Measurements

Length (Overall): 580’5” | 176.91 m

Width (Overall): 303’6” | 92.5 m
Area (Overall): 157,092 ft2 | 14,594 m2
Radius (Inner): 119’9” | 36.5 m
Length (Center): 276’ 10” | 84.39 m
Lane Width: 4’ | 1.22 m
Races: 100m, 200m, 400m
History and Development of Track and Field
The ancient Olympic Games began in the year 776 BC, when Koroibos, a cook from the nearby city
of Elis, won the stadium race, a foot race 600 feet long. According to some literary traditions, this
was the only athletic event of the games for the first 13 Olympic festivals. Other evidence, both
literary and archaeological, suggests that the games may have existed at Olympia much earlier than
this date, perhaps as early as the tenth or ninth century BC. A series of bronze tripods have been
found at Olympia, some of which appear to be dated at about the ninth century BC, and it has also
been suggested that these tripods may in fact be prizes for some of the early events at Olympia.
Track-and-field athletics in the United States dates from the 1860s. The Intercollegiate Association
of Amateur Athletes of America, the nation’s first national athletic group, held the first collegiate
races in 1873, and in 1888 the Amateur Athletic Union (which governed the sport for nearly a
century) held its first championships.
As track and field developed as a modern sport, a major issue for all athletes was their status as
amateurs. For many years track and field was considered a purely amateur sport and athletes could
not accept training money or cash prizes.
If charged with professionalism, athletes could be banned from competition for life. In 1913,
American Jim Thorpe was stripped of his 1912 Olympic victories in the decathlon and pentathlon
and banned from further competition after it was learned he had played semiprofessional baseball.
(In 1982, the International Olympic Committee [IOC] posthumously restored both Thorpe’s amateur
status and his two Olympic medals.)
Beginning in the 1920s, track and field’s scope widened. The first NCAA national championships
were held for men in 1921, and women’s track and field became part of the Olympic Games in 1928.
In 1952, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) sent its first Olympic team ever to the
Summer Games in Helsinki, Finland, where the squad captured several track-and-field medals. Over
the next 30 years, the U.S. and Soviet teams battled in one of the sport’s longest and most
competitive rivalries. Women’s track struggled for widespread acceptance until the 1970s, when
track and field as a whole enjoyed a boom in popularity. During that time, the U.S.-based
International Track Association (ITA) organized a professional track circuit. The venture, although
popular among fans, went bankrupt after several years. Few athletes wanted to participate in ITA
competitions because athletes were actually receiving larger illegal payments for appearing at
amateur meets than legitimate professionals were making on the new circuit. Many athletes also
turned away from ITA competition because it disqualified them from participating in future Olympic
Games. The Athletics Congress now regulates the sport in the United States; the International
Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF) sanctions international competition. Track and field has been
the centerpiece of the Summer Olympic Games since their revival in 1896. International professional
running, initiated in the 1970s, has had limited success.