Javelin Throwing

JAVELIN THROWING, the art of throwing a spear to the greatest possible distance in a straight line at right angles to a given scratch line.

Javelin throwing is a natural, war-like sport, which was prac tised at the ancient Olympic Games and has been revived in the modern Olympiads instituted at Athens in 1896 (see OLYMPIC GAMES). The modern javelin consists of a wooden shaft attached to a sharp steel point and having about the centre of gravity a grip 16 centimetres broad formed of a binding of whipcord. The total length of the javelin must not exceed 8.5ft. nor the total weight be less than 1.6 lb.

The throw is made from behind a scratch line marked upon the ground and the javelin must be held by the grip. The thrower may take as long a run-up as he wishes, but may neither touch, nor overstep, the scratch line until the point of the javelin has met the ground at the end of the flight. The throw is measured from the point at which the head of the javelin strikes the ground to the scratch line, or the scratch line produced. Each competitor is allowed three trial throws and the best three (at the Olympic Games the best six) are allowed three more throws. Each corn petitor is credited with the best of all his throws.

As an athletic event this sport has been popular in Scandinavia longer than anywhere else among modern civilized peoples, and the finest throwers still come from Finland.

It is in Finland, too, that the best javelins are made, the shafts being chosen only from the outer, sunside layer of the finest Finnish birch trees. A javelin so shafted will fly anything up to Soft. further than one which is shafted with English ash, which is not so stiff.

The first country to hold a javelin throwing championship in modern times was Sweden (1896). In that year Harold Ander son reached 203f t., the aggregate of his right and left hand throws being added together. The improvement that has taken place is clearly indicated by the fact that the six placed men at the Olympic Games, 1936, throwing with the best hand only, all exceeded 22oft. The records in 1936 stood at : World's, M. Jarvinen, Finland, 253ft. 1936; Olympic, M. Jarvinen,

238ft. 6.9 in., 1932; U.S.A., A. Terry, 226ft. 2iin.; English, S. Wilson, I9I ft. 2iin.

The sport is a comparatively simple one to practise, but the whole secret of obtaining distance lies in the athlete's ability to make the throw with the run and without any break in the rhythm of speed or action, and of getting the javelin smoothly away from the hand without setting up tremors in the wooden shaft. The material point is to transmit the power in the longi tudinal direction of the javelin so that it may fly through the air in a straight line.

Method of Throwing.

The thrower grasps the javelin by the centre grip with the hand above the shoulder, point of the javelin directed downwards. He takes up his position some 25yd. be hind the scratch line and facing the direction in which the throw is to be made. He runs lightly forward at increasing speed, and i62ft. from the scratch line he draws back the throwing arm to its fullest extent. The upper part of the body is gradually turned in the direction of the drawn-back arm. Eight and a half feet from the throwing line the right leg is bent and the left foot firmly planted as a point of resistance, and the throw is made by the pressing up of the right hip, the straightening out of the rear leg and the action of drawing the right hand, which holds the javelin, strongly forward above the right shoulder on a level with the thrower's ear. During the throw both feet should be upon the ground; after the javelin has left the hand the feet are quickly reversed.

See F. A. M. Webster, Athletics (1925) ; Silfverstrand and Ras mussen, Illustrated Text Book of Athletics (1926) ; T. E. Jones, Track and Field (1926). (F. A. M. W.) JAW, in anatomy, the term for the upper maxillary bone, and the mandible or lower maxillary bone of the skull; it is sometimes loosely applied to all the lower front parts of the skull (q.v.).