List of world records in athletics
s in athletics are ratified by the International Association of Athletics Federations. Athletics records comprise the best performances in the sports of track and field, road running and racewalking.
Records are kept for all events contested at the Olympic Games and some others. Unofficial records for some other events are kept by track and field statisticians. The only non-metric track distance for which official records are kept is the mile run.
Criteria
The Criteria which must be satisfied for ratification also apply to national or other restricted records and also to performances submitted as qualifying marks for eligibility to compete in major events such as the Olympic Games.The criteria include:
- The dimensions of the track and equipment used must conform to standards. In road events, the course must be accurately measured, by a certified measurer.
- Except in road events, the performance must be set in a single-sex race, with the sole exception of the mixed-sex 4 × 400 m relay, introduced by the IAAF in 2017. However, the IAAF has yet to recognise a world record in this particular event.
- All team members in a relay race must be of the same nationality.
- Pacemakers are allowed, provided they have not been lapped; lapped athletes must give way.
- Drug testing immediately after the performance is now required for ratification of a record. Existing records which predate this requirement are still extant. Athletes who pass the immediate test but are later found to have been using banned substances have their performances invalidated.
- In running events up to 200 m in distance and in horizontal jump events, wind assistance is permitted only up to 2.0 m/s. In decathlon or heptathlon, average wind assistance of less than 2.0 m/s is required across all applicable disciplines; and maximum of 4.0 m/s in any one event.
- In running events up to 800 m in distance, photo finish fully automatic timing is required.
- There is no restriction on altitude; since the thinner atmosphere of higher altitude provides less air resistance, locations such as Mexico City and Sestriere have previously been the sites of records in the sprint and jump events. See effects of high altitude on humans. Records set at high altitude venues are often marked with an "A" though that does not disqualify it as a record. Under those circumstances, a "sea level" best is also tracked by statisticians. Long-distance races run at altitude, with less oxygen available to the athlete, have been shown to be to the athlete's disadvantage.
- In road events, the course is not required to be a circuit, but the overall decrease in elevation between the start and finish shall not exceed 1:1000, i.e. 1 m/km.
- In road events, the start and finish points of a course, measured along a theoretical straight line between them, shall not be further apart than 50% of the race distance.
Bonus payments
Some middle-distance runners have specialized in acting as pacemakers in longer races, receiving a fee without even finishing the race, and possibly a bonus if a record results. This is a useful occupation for athletes who are capable of running accurately to a specified pace, but not capable of the very fastest times to become champions in their own right.
In the pole vault record bonuses create an incentive for an athlete capable of smashing a record to instead break it by the minimum amount, multiple times, at multiple meetings, in order to accumulate multiple bonuses. This has been done by Sergey Bubka in the men's pole vault, and Yelena Isinbayeva in the women's pole vault. Some commentators have complained that neither athlete ever posted as high a mark as they were capable of. In any other discipline, except in the high jump, this issue does not arise, since it is practically impossible to deliberately break a record by a small margin.
World records
The IAAF commenced the recognition of world records in 1912, and indoor world records after 1987. In 2000, IAAF rule 260.18a was amended, so that "world records" can be set in a facility "with or without roof." This rule was not applied retroactively, and has, thus far, only affected the men's and women's pole vault, and women's 2,000 m. The women's vault record has been advanced 9 times indoors by three different women, each ratified as a world record. The last record to be set indoors was in 2004. Sergey Bubka's 1993 pole vault world indoor record of 6.15 m was not considered to be a world record, because it was set before the new rule came into effect. In February 2014, Bubka's record was surpassed indoors by Renaud Lavillenie jumping 6.16 m which qualifies as both the Indoor world record and the world record.A new IAAF-sanctioned event, the women 50,000 m walk, does not yet have any recognised world record.
Key to tables
h = hand timing+ = to a longer distance
A = affected by altitude
OT = oversized track
X = annulled due to doping violations
- = not officially ratified by IAAF
est = estimate
i = set indoors
Men
Women
Mixed
Indoor world records
Men
Women
Best performances in non-IAAF World Record events
Events which do not qualify for IAAF-ratified world records are typically referred to as world bests.While races over imperial measured distances were very common in the first half of 20th century, only the mile remains common today due to its historical prominence in track and field, as all other imperial measured distance races became increasingly rare, and the IAAF removed these imperial measured events from the world record lists in 1976.
Official record status was removed by World Athletics in November 2019 for several long distance events, including track distances of 20,000 metres, 25,000 metres and 30,000 metres and road distances of 15 km, 20 km, 25 km and 30 km.
Some road racing distances and indoor variations of outdoor events fall outside of IAAF's lists. Records set in uncommon events usually do not adhere to the strict criteria found in IAAF-ratifiable events; one example is the 150 metres record, which was set by Usain Bolt on a specially-made straight track, while previous performances were completed on a traditional circuit which included a partial bend in the track.
The 40-yard dash, a standard acceleration evaluation for American Football players, does not fall within the usual criteria of athletics racing events. In most 40-yard dashes, reaction times are not recorded as timing starts only once the player is in motion, and the standards for timing a "football 40" are so lax and inconsistent that a real world record cannot be claimed. Performances are also hand-timed and calculated to 1/100th of a second, although studies show human beings simply cannot react consistently or accurately enough for this to be a valid method, and even those using light beams are timed by the motion of the athlete, still removing the normal factor of reaction time, while football 40-yard dashes are usually run on a turf surface, as opposed to an all weather track.
All these factors make track and "football 40" performances essentially incomparable. The world best time for a "football 40" is 4.17 by Deion Sanders, while the extrapolated best for an Olympic level athlete, including reacting to a starting gun, is 4.24 by Maurice Greene at the 2001 World Championships in Athletics.
Outdoor events
Men
Women
Indoor events
Men
Women
Javelin specifications
The men's javelin specification was changed with effect from 1986, and the women's from 2000. The purpose was to reduce the number of illegal flat landings, but a side-effect was to reduce the distance travelled. The prior world records in individual men's and women's javelin were invalidated, but the prior records in decathlon and heptathlon were not.The old specification records for men's and women's javelin were as follows:
| Event | Record | Athlete | Date | Meeting | Location | Ref | ||
| Men's | East Berlin | |||||||
| Women's | Potsdam |
The current decathlon world record was set with the current javelin specification. The best performance in heptathlon using the new specification javelin is: