One of the great athletic competitions is the Men’s Long Jump. It has been a part of the athletics events since their beginnings. It demands a combination of speed, power and lift.
As with the Women’s Long Jump, the rules are strict; for example no part of the foot must land over the board and there is a special strip of plasticine to detect if this happens. In theory a gymnast could jump further by taking off with two feet and possibly doing a somersault, but both these actions are banned.
Great Britain has had some success in the Long Jump, with Lynn Davies from Wales winning in Tokyo in 1964. Perhaps the most famous Long Jump event occurred in 1968 where Bob Beamon smashed the World Record with a jump of 8.90 metres. Try marking that on a path outside and see just how far it is! His record lasted many years before Mike Powell broke it in 1991.
This worksheet looks at some of these famous long jumpers and the distances they achieved. There are some tricky subtraction of decimals to answer, plus a graph to create to show distances jumped.