Peter O'Connor (athlete)

Peter O'Connor (born October 24, 1872 in Millom , Cumbria , England , † November 9, 1957 in Waterford , Ireland ) was an Irish athlete who was successful in the jumping disciplines.

O'Connor grew up in Ashtown, County Wicklow , Ireland. He joined the Gaelic Athletic Association in 1896. For a decade he was a preeminent athlete in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland . He won the long jump championship of the British Amateur Athletic Association from 1901 to 1906 and the high jump title in 1903 and 1904 .

The world record

In 1901 O'Connor set the world record in the long jump for the first time with 7.51 meters. He rose over 7.54 to 7.60 meters. On August 5, 1901, he jumped 7.61 meters in Dublin . When the International Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF) published the first official world record list in 1912 , Peter O'Connor's jump was also included after no one had jumped any further.

This first official world record in the long jump lasted almost 20 years until Edward Gourdin jumped 7.69 meters on July 23, 1921 . Only the legendary jumps of Mike Powell (8.95 meters in 1991), Jesse Owens (8.13 meters in 1935) at the age of 25 and of Bob Beamon (8.90 meters in 1968) at the age of 23 had or will last even longer. The performance was only surpassed as a British record by Welshman Lynn Davies in 1962. As an Irish record, O'Connor's distance lasted until 1990, when Carlos O'Connell jumped 7.63 meters.

Olympic Intermediate Games 1906

Three Irish athletes, John Daly , Con Leahy and Peter O'Connor drove to Athens for the 1906 Olympic Intermediate Games . There they learned that only recognized National Olympic Committees were allowed to start. They were therefore not allowed to compete for Ireland, but started for the United Kingdom.

O'Connor was second in the long jump with 7.025 meters behind the American Meyer Prinstein , who jumped 7.20 meters. In the high jump, which Leahy won, O'Connor also started, but did not make it into the top eight jumpers. Ultimately, O'Connor won the triple jump with 14.075 meters from Leahy, who jumped 13.98 meters.

After 1906 O'Connor won no more titles. He remained connected to the long jump and Irish athletics as a functionary and referee.

Peter O'Connor was 1.84 m tall and weighed 76 kg. By profession, O'Connor was a lawyer in Waterford.

The flagpole incident

With the Irish competing for Great Britain in the Olympics, O'Connor climbed the flagpole to celebrate his teammate Con Leahy's Olympic victory with the Irish flag. After a short time he was brought down by the judges, but he had made his position as an Irish nationalist clear.

Top performances

• High jump: 1.88 meters
• Long jump: 7.61 meters
• Triple jump: 14.63 meters

literature

• Manfred Holzhausen: world records and world record holder - high jump / long jump. Grevenbroich 1999
• Ekkehard zur Megede: The Modern Olympic Century 1896–1996 Track and Fields Athletics. Berlin 1999 (published by the German Society for Athletics Documentation eV )

Web links

• Peter O'Connor in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )

Individual evidence

1. ^ Arnd Krüger : Olympic Games as a means of politics. In: Eike Emrich, Martin-Peter Büch, Werner Pitsch (eds.): Olympic Games - still up to date? Values, goals, reality from a multidisciplinary perspective. Universitätsverlag des Saarlandes, Saarbrücken 2013, ISBN 978-3-86223-108-9 , pp. 35–54, especially p. 40; see. Guiney, D. (1996). The Olympic Council of Ireland. Citius, Altius Fortius 4 (3), 31-33.